The Flame King
by Knucklejoe8
Summary: A naive child sits on a gilded throne meant for kings. A false idol sits on a coveted seat meant for the wise. Yet another sleeps with blood of ice. None of them have beholden a flame like you have. Show them why.
1. Welcome to the New World

_Dark Souls and Akame ga Kill belong to their respective owners. I own nothing._

* * *

My soul was as black as the mud beneath me. I know that as a fact. I saw it before. In one of the most god-forsaken places on the planet, burning slowly, I peered into myself. And that's what I found.

Complete and utter blackness. That was what I knew was there, under my burning flesh and skin. It was a scary thought, being something completely unnatural. Even others like me were at least had souls with some light in them. I too got to see those when they were finding a new host.

But then again, it still made sense. This was not the place that I was from. In the place I came from, such things like magic and miracles didn't exist. But here, in the land of Lordran, it did. In fact, I had the ability to use them, even mastered them.

But that fact was what kept me going. Even if I had to throw away my past to move on, it came back the moment I kindled the first flame. It kept me sane, preventing me from entering the same madness that overtook the Lord of Cinders. I wanted to go back, for I knew that the world that I used to be from was kind.

Or at least, more kind than Lordran was.

The knowledge that I gained from the previous world stayed, but all the memories were gone. Like knowing that there was a continent called 'North America', but not knowing where you learned it. It was annoying, to say the least.

So there I was, sitting in the kiln of the first flame, everything ablaze, contemplating my soul. To some, the scene would be considered disturbing and painful to watch, but after burning for such a long time, to me it was just annoying. After burning for over a century, one gets used to the intense heat.

Staring into the flame, I noticed something out of the corner of my vision. Turning my helmeted head in the direction, I found a dark tear in the middle of the air.

It was similar to the portal that brought me to the past, into Oolacile to save Princess Dusk after the 'hero' of the abyss failed to do so. It was caused by the Old One wanting the other half of his precious pendant, even to reach through time to get to it. The time spent there was rather strange, meeting and speaking to the other two of the four knights of Gywn, and meeting Chester, that sly bastard. Gough even gave me his bow after slaying the dragon, as he was blinded and could no longer leave his tower.

But that was in the past, and the new portal might lead to somewhere more interesting than the burning pit I had resided in. Slowly picking myself up off the ground, I walked towards the black tear. But as I neared, I noticed something strange. It wasn't murky like the last one was. This one was very much clear, and in the center a dimmed light emitted.

Carefully, I approached. Reaching out with my still burning right hand, no pull occured nor did a giant rotting hand come out and grab me. So I reached out with both arms, and pulled on the sides of the tear. Surprisingly, the tear widened as I did.

I looked back at the first flame. It was still burning brightly, even without my presense, and would probably do so for a long time coming. I thought about staying here. True, I would remain burning, but the place felt like home in a way that I could not understand. Perhaps it was the effect that happened to all undead, the attraction to the bonfires.

I looked away. The portal too called to me. It had a purpose for being there. So I took the chance. Taking one last look at my 'home' from the previous century, I leaned back and fell through the portal.

And unsurprisingly, when I did I was met with darkness.

* * *

I came to some time later. I knew that there was something strange, as being undead would not allow the bearer the comfort of unconsciousness. Even getting crushed by a massive rock was not enough to knockout an undead, and there they would remain until they lifted the rock, killed themselves, or the worst, hollowed.

Hollowing was a process that all undead would succumb to, regardless of birth, strength, intelligence, ect. It happened when the undead lost the will to go on, and their souls go through a permenant change, making them attack relentlessly. But weirdly enough, they would not attack another hollow unless provoked, like an unseen truce.

There were several ways to prevent hollowing. The most common way to do so was collecting humanity. Having humanity made it harder for an undead to be driven mad, and made them more closer to being human. It could be collected from anything from a rat that comsumed a poor soul to outright robbing another human/undead of theirs. But collecting humanities has a downside. Getting too many meant you relied on them, and the moment you lost them you would immediately hollow.

Another way was to simply have a purpose you would die over and over again just to occomplish. It was this willpower that allowed undead to live for extreme amounts of time. Big Hat Logan had lived for more than a century all because of his unending thrist for knowledge. Even this was not without it's downsides either. If your conviction was too low then you would hollow. And if you somehow complete your purpose, you will also hollow, as afterwards you cannot just go out and die forever. You would simply come back. The only way to avoid it was to find another goal almost immediately.

I once had a purpose like that. I was filled with the tales of undead explorers going out and being heroes among men. That I was the one to save the world, and remake the world anew. But those tales ended as I began to learn the true nature of Lordran.

So sleeping was frightening. Not losing consciousness for over a century and suddenly becoming unconscious was terrifying. You lose your sense of surroundings, control of your entire body and the only thing to be seen was black darkness.

When I came to, I was lying on the ground. Opening my eyes, I blinked clear them as I was no longer used to waking up. Then I sat up and looked around. The semi long grass and mix of pine and oak trees told me I was in a forest. Looking down, ants seemed to find my sudden appearance interesting and were currently scurrying all around my legs. But not once did they touch for my limbs were still soaked in flames. Strangely, despite being surrounded by flammable wood, the flames coating my body refused to burn them. Not even the heat transfered, as I reached down and held a leaf in my hand without it burning.

Curious, I sent out a little of my pyromancy flame onto the leaf. Immediately it burned to ashes and flew away in the wind. It seemed like my pyromancy flame could still burn things, but the flames on my body did not. It was probably due to the similarity with bonfires, as they only burned the remains of humans. Still investigating, I reached down and touched an ant. It burst into flames.

Unsurprised, I stood up and began to look around. In most directions there was forest, but behind where I had slept, in the distance was a large wall. I sensed no danger around me, so I figured that was as good a place as any. So I controlled the flames around me to sink beneath my armor and began walking towards it.

I eventually made it to a small secluded meadow. The wall was more bigger and farther away than I had originally anticipated. It seemed like a good place to rest, after all. Walking to the side of the open area, I sat down and leaned up against a tree. I closed my eyes. Not to sleep, but to collect my thoughts and plan ahead.

That is until...

Almost casually, I tilted my head to the side as a knife occupied the place where it used to be. I opened one of my eyes and looked through the slit of my helmet. Even if the knife had hit, it would have just bounced off my helm. It was a warning shot. Before me looked like 3 bandits, and they were prepared to rob me blind. It seemed like my armour was expensive looking enough for them to try me.

I stood up. Their intent was clear as day. They were out to kill me regardless if I gave them all my items or not. One of them spoke up. "If you wanna live, drop your armor on the ground." He gave his most winning smile; it was digusting.

These people were one of the lowest types. Even if the Way of White had gone out and hunted undead, they had good reasons: To protect the population from hollows, at least until the curse spread far and wide. But these people were killers for money, and they weren't hired for a cause.

They did so because they could, and perhaps enjoyed it too.

The same bandit spoke up again. "Fine. You leave us no choice." His smile dropped and instead changed into a savage grin. He and the other two leveled their weapons at me, prepared to charge.

I stood still. There was no need for words. It was going to be a battle after all. I didn't even know if my voicebox even worked anymore. But I was relaxed. Overly so.

Because I knew there was nothing they could do to me.

Taking a sidestep I dodged a stab that came from behind. It had been trained at the base of my skull, aiming to kill through a weak spot on my armor. While the bandit was quite stealthy, I had seen better before.

As he overextended himself, I turned and sent a quick kick directly into his shin, and he tripped. Using my momentum, I stepped forward and kneed him under the ribs with my other leg. He bowed over and landed on his ass. As he tried to regain breath and get away at the same time, his leg slipped and he fell back down.

I decided to end his misery at that point. Twisting myself into position, I sent a kick aimed directly at his head. As my foot moved closer to his head, he only had enough time for his eyes to widen before it hit him.

And decapitated him completely.

It was a messy kill. Blood, brains and other liquids flew out of the cavity where his head used to be. His body fell back and bleed over the meadow as his head was sent flying, crushed in all ways possible. I turned back to the bandits. Surprise and fear was written all over their faces. I suppose they didn't think I would notice. And even if they did...

It all took place in the span of five seconds.

And to give a comparison, it took them ten to react.

"Wahhh...!?" Was all that came out of the leaders mouth before I positioned myself to run at them. That was all it took for them to run, scrambling and possibly pissing themselves as they did.

I just stood there, watching them. Most people with my strength would've ran after them, but I wasn't most people. They weren't worth the time and I understood that they would die eventually, either from killing each other or by the hands of whatever authority was out there. Human nature was something that I knew very well.

I turned to the body. There was a small chance that they would come back to try and get his body, if they still had the thought. But that bit of 'humanity' that they would have had was wiped clean when I leveled my hand at the poor corpse.

Feeling the flames coursing through my veins, I whipped my hand at it. "Flame Whip." My pyromancy flame sprung to life, and surged forward to consume it. It was burned within seconds, leaving only scarce ashes on the untouched grass.

Shrugging my shoulders, I pointed towards the wall again, and walked. I didn't get a break, but bothering with reinforcements would be annoying, if they came.

The walk through the forest was largely uneventful. None of the trees compared to the large ones of Lordran, and they weren't nearly as interesting. There were some insects that looked completely foreign to me, but they were just that. Insects.

I found myself on a dirt road. At first it seemed like there was no one, but then I looked to the left and saw a cart moving slowly away from my position. Deciding that following it would be the best idea, I started to jog as to catch up to it.

I was stopped however when the earth in front of the cart, sending rocks and dirt everywhere. Out of the screen created came a giant lizard. It was quite large, the size of one Giant, and had scales not unlike the ones of the Everlasting Dragon's.

I reached down and grasped my sword. It was an oppertunity to once again test my skills against something more bigger and possibly faster than myself. I took three steps forward before being stopped again, but this time by a person.

He had dark blonde hair, and peasants clothing. He seemed to be in his late teens to early adulthood, but the most impotant thing was the sword he was holding. It was a straightsword, with a perculiar red pommel. And it was being used to cut the lizard to pieces.

The boy jumped up and, using gravity to his advantage, cut with a fashion unlike the way Artorias used to, which is to say like a buzz saw. Landing lightly on his feet, the lizard remained standing for a second before collapsing on the ground.

Two of the carts riders started to cheer, but the words they said escaped me. I had entered the forest to the side of the road, and looked at the boy.

If there were people and creatures that strong here.

I grinned. This new place was going to be very interesting indeed.

* * *

_..._

_Yeah I don't really know why I just started another project like this, which I probably won't finish if this goes just like all my other projects so far. The thought of that makes me really depressed actually._

_Anyway, this story is of the Chosen Undead (CU) ending up in the Akame ga Kill universe, if you haven't noticed. I don't really know why I started this, but I now have a reason to continue writing this. Which is the CU verses Esdeath. A battle of fire and ice. A fight between one who burned the entire world and one who can freeze time itself._

_Yeah. Anyway, here are the CU stats:_

**Soul Level : 250**

**Starting Class : Knight**

Vitality : 40

Attunement : 25

Endurance : 40

Strength : 50

Dexterity : 30

Resistance : 15

Intelligence : 20

Faith : 30

**Armor**

Elite Knight Set + 10

**Armaments**

Greatshield of Artorias + 5

Sunlight Straight Sword +15

Gough's Greatbow + 5

Demon's Greataxe + 5

Ascended Pyromancy Flame + 5

Canvas Talisman

Oolacile Ivory Catalyst

**Spells**

All Pyromancies

Most Miracles except Bountiful Sunlight, Soothing Sunlight, and Sunlight Spear

Limited Sorceries

_So that's about it. This has been _Joe_, signing out!_


	2. Getting a Job

_Dark Souls and Akame ga Kill belong to their respective owners. I own nothing._

* * *

I'm not exactly the smartest person. Hell, I couldn't even tell how insincere Patches was, and only afterwards did I see all the signs. And it was clear as day too.

But in my heart, I always had space for a good book. Perhaps it was a trait that carried over from my homeland, but I wouldn't know. It allowed me to learn the tales and miracles of Gwyn and his fellow knights, and call upon their power when needed. Each one of them were told on scrolls that I had to read, remember and use.

I had gotten pretty good at reciting them too, and could do so in less than a second.

Sorceries were a little different. It was the art of manipulating your or others souls into helpful tools or weapons. It required knowledge of the souls itself, something that I didn't bother with much. I did however learn some as they were held in books, which I had found in Seath's private Library.

After a certain point everything began to go over my head and I gave up on learning more, as it would've taken at least more than a year to advance further, even if I had been offered help from Logan when he was still sane.

I managed to get in the city within the big wall without any problem. The security seemed really lax for a place that was the capital of an empire. Admittedly, the ruling class from what I'd overheard lived in a heavily guarded palace located in the middle of the city, but still. Most rulers would not be so relaxed with the border guards.

Still, what surprised me the most was the lack of hollows. This seemed like a world without the undead, and the fact that people weren't attacking me from all angles and corners with mad skill was disheartening. I missed those little schuffles.

I was walking down the street when I saw something interesting. A book store. I decided to approach and noticed that no one paid any attention to me, even in my armor. I wrote it off as though armor was a common sight to them. Hopefully they wouldn't notice the flames that occasionally slipped through my armor or the heat from my presence.

I entered the shop. Looking around, I saw many different types of books. Adventure books, magazines, how to's and romances were among the supplies of books here. My eyes, however, found the mythological section of the most interesting. Most of the books were fairytales, mostly targeted around children, but one held my attention the most.

'The Story Of The First Flame.' On the cover it showed a bonfire with a sword in the middle. It was familiar, extremely so. I spent a hundred years in front of one just like that after all. I reach out a gloved hand to grasp the book when...

"May I help you sir?"

I spun on the spot and reached down to grasp the handle of my sword. I immediately relaxed though because I realized what I was doing: going into a store without announcing my presence. Even if it had been a long time since I'd been in any store, but I still knew my proper etiquette. Few people were able to sneak up on me like that though, even if I had my guard down.

"Ahh sorry," I said, instinctively reaching up to the back of my head, but quickly realized I still had my helmet and let it down. "I was just looking at this book here." I picked up 'The Story Of The First Flame' and looked at the back. No information was there, just bindings. "Could you tell me about it? It's a story that I don't recognize." My voice was softer than I remembered, but then again the last time I spoke was with Solaire all those years ago.

The person who was, I presumed, the shopowner nodded his head. He was a rather young man with green hair long enough to cover his face. Under a coat of the same color, he had a plain white shirt and blue jeans. He seemed like the average young shopowner who was trying to go up the list of popular shops and become rich.

Except when I looked into his eyes. On the surface they were dull, almost stupid looking. However I, who once peered into the souls of mortals and gods alike, saw something I didn't expect. Under his rather impressive facade was the eyes of a killer. His eyes were already finding several different ways to kill me. Aparently this one wasn't as pure as I first thought.

However he didn't have any hostile intent, and so long as I didn't do anything he wouldn't as well.

He reached up and plucked the book from my hands. He didn't seem to flinch when he did, so either I was getting better at controlling the fire around me or he did well to hide the pain. And if you are wondering, in the kiln I couldn't control it because of the fires around me, so I never got any practice.

"'The Story Of The First Flame?'" He held his head in one hand and nodded. "It's a rather good tale, and pretty long too. I'd recommend it. Would you like to know a summary of it? I guaranty that it'll be spoiler free."

I nod.

"Okay." He starts flipping through pages at fast speeds, as though reviewing the text, which he probably was. "So the premise of the book is that's there's a guy called Prometheus." I had to physically stop myself from flinching at the name. "He's a god, and is older than the rest of the gods. So one day he was bored and decided that something needed to be done. So he trolled the rest of the gods. And was punished for it. The end."

I stood there, staring dumbfounded. "Er, that's kind of a blunt summary there. I don't think many people would come here if you summarize that way for all your books, you know that right?"

He stood there for moment. Each passing second his face got a little bit more blank. Suddenly, he burst.

"Goddammit! I knew there was a reason I don't have many regulars!" He fumed on the spot. "If only I had someone who could do sell it for me..." He thought for a second, and then looked in my direction. A grin was plastered on his face.

"Say... If you knew that I wasn't selling it well, would you be willing to do so for me? You seem like someone who knows how to sell a product. I'll be sure to pay you good if you make sales." He started to lean in my direction, getting a little too close for comfort, so I leaned away in response.

I quickly thought about it. If I did, I would be able to find out where I was and what was happening. I might be also able to get a building to 'rest' in. On the flip side, I might get caught as an undead, or found burning down buildings on accident.

The goods out weighed the bad, as I was pretty sure that I could defend myself if the bads happened.

"Do you have any space that I could stay in? I'm new to this region and am looking for a place to stay while I'm here." Not lying, but still hiding the fact that I don't belong.

"Uh yeah! Come, it's up stairs." He replaces the book on the shelf and leads me up to the second floor. At the first door to the right, he opens it for me and lets me in.

It was a small but comfy room. The window was postioned over the bed at the side of the room as to wake up the owner early in the morning. At the other side was a small cabinet, and a hanger. Off to the side was a sink and mirror. It seemed like a small apartment.

"I bought the building with this room, and I never found a reason to use it. I hope it fits your standard."

I walked in the middle of the room and took a closer look. There wasn't anything that was out of place, nor was there anything that would endanger me here. It was nice.

"I think I'll take it. It's a deal. My name's Mark. I hope to get along with you in the future." I hold out my hand to him. He grins and takes it.

"Rabac." He began to turn away when he stopped and turned back.

"Oh yeah. You said something about you just being here for a while?" He asked.

"As you can see, I'm a traveler." I gesture to my armor and supplies. "I take small jobs like this to earn some money and board. The last place I ran out of money and was promptly kicked out." I knew at this point those were flat out lies, but not saying anything would've been suspicious.

"Well, just make sure you earn your keep." He let out a yawn. "Alright. I'll let you go and get comfortable. I expect you to work tomorrow, though." And with that, he left. I closed and locked the door behind him. He seemed rather carefree, and the fact that he wasn't questioning me at all was strange. But hey, I got work and boarding so I was cool with that.

I waited until I was sure that he left, and I started to remove my armor. Removing my helmet, I unstrapped my arms from their gauntlet. I then began to work on my boots. I first removed the knee guard then unbelted the shin guard. I then removed the boot itself, and mimicked the action on my other foot.

I moved back up and began to remove my upper arm armor. I slipped the left elbow and shoulder platings off, leaving my left arm mostly bare. I noted that small embers still burned on my skin, but ignored it in favor of getting the armor off carefully.

Pulling my arms into the under armor, I took it off, making sure to keep my knecklace on. Placing it carefully on the bed, I began to remove my belts, which I used to hold my extra gear, like my estus flask and bottom less box. Strangely, both had survived the flames. Seeing as the estus flask wouldn't break even under Smough's hammer, I wasn't very surprised by that. But the Bottomless Box was made of wood, yet lived just the same. I decided not to think to hard about that and I placed them next to my armor.

I then stripped off the thick drake leather pants and folded next to the rest of my stuff, leaving me in just my loincloth. I began to inspect each piece of armor, until I noticed a small detail I almost missed.

Every one was clean, neatly so. Despite all the times I spent running and sweating in the thing, it was devoid of any soot or stains. It was strange. I was about to ignore it until I saw another ember leap off my arm.

'Perhaps it's another ability of the flames,' I thought. I reached into the bottomless box and pulled out a piece of clothing that I didn't exactly like. The Bloated Head. I kept it as a souvenir from Oolacile, but when a white phantom hollowed it out and offered it as a helmet, I never brought it out again.

Ugh. That one was almost as bad as dealing with Chester.

I took it in my hand and flowed the flames around me towards my fish. It easily collected in my fist, but didn't burn, similar to my pyromancy flame. It did however start flowing around the head, like liquid water, like the estus.

As it did so, it burned brightly and filled my vision, causing me to look away until the light went away. When I turned back, I was somewhat startled by the result.

The Bloated Head was no longer dirty. In fact, it seemed to shine in the amount of light the room I was given. The red eyes sparkled brightly. Even the cracks were highlighted, but in a way that made it look like little polished battle wounds.

I tipped the head over and glanced into the hole. The previously mucus filled opening was now dry, and looked similar to normal leather.

Though I still refused to wear the blasted thing, it looked better (and more importantly, smelled better) than it used to. I rubbed my finger against the edge of the head. It was smoother than before and didn't feel like sandpaper.

I picked it up and tossed it back into the bottomless box. I then turned my attention to the flames around me. After 'cleansing' the head, it went back to the normal burning of all of my flesh. The fact that I could clean my armor without using my remaining repair powder would be immensely helpful. But that also meant that these flames might be able to do more, and I was willing to experiment.

I willed the flames to once again gather in my open hand, and it did so. All of the flames on the surface of my body were gone. It didn't mean the flames went away though, as I still felt the flames burning inside of me.

The flame in my fist was much more different than my pyromancy flame. Instead of flowing around calmly and suddenly bursting into chaos, this flame was the opposite. It was wild, flailing around madly until it had a purpose, in which it became orderly and neat.

It was weird seeing a flame that I held do that. I was far too used to the pyromancy flame.

When I used the fire around me, it mostly removed the flames on the surface of my skin.

'I wonder...' I began to will the flames around me and sent it into the pit of my stomach.

White hot pain spiked through my entire body. Granted, it wasn't that painful in comparison to some that I'd experianced before, but it still hurt.

I grunted and held in a gasp. I felt myself over. All of the surface flames disappeared, though I could feel the heat just above my chest. So, I spread the flames just under the surface. The pain was significantly reduced. At least now I could go out in public without people screaming about a burning spirit ghost.

I looked down and realized I was still naked, and in human form. I reached into my Bottomless Box and pulled out my best looking set of clothing: Chester's.

I quickly pulled it on and looked myself in the mirror. I almost looked as much of a jackass as Chester did. That's just great.

It was still my best looking piece, so I decided it was time to go out and look around this new place.

I adjusted my jacket and leg strapped knife. I turned to the door, pulling it open, and walked out.

It was time to shine.

* * *

_Another quick chapter. Please don't expect it to be this fast all the time, or for it to be finished. I don't want to let you guys down. This isn't usually the pace that I write at, but I'm doing so while I still have wifi to update the story._

_Okay I know some people will be wondering what the hell I'm doing. And to answer that, I have no freaking idea. Having CU work for Lubbock (or Rabac, if it fits your cup of tea) will allow him to interact with both the Jaegers and Night Raid, and eventually Wild for how I did it, well I have found no proof that he has any workers and with the fact that he's from a merchant family he knows the importance of appealing to costumers, and he kinda isn't in that regard. After that... well not much. I guess if any of you have any ideas I'm open to suggestions, so long as it allows the CU to eventually fight Esdeath._

_Next thing: The First Flame. For people wondering, the flames that surround him have been melded with his soul, allowing him to freely manipulate it, with a cost of course. I also needed him to be able interact with characters without giving him away, aside from if they smell him or get a hold of his skin._

_If you have any questions/concerns, feel free to leave a review or private message. I'm open to criticism._

_Anyway, this has been Joe, signing out!_


	3. Looking to the Past and Present

_Dark Souls and Akame Ga Kill belong to their respective owners. I own nothing._

* * *

Perhaps the greatest,yet at the same time worst, thing that I earned in Lordran was the ability to read anything. I could read several different languages, I could read maps, I could read spells and miracles... But the most useful was the ability to read people.

In a single glance, I could determine if they had a weapon, their skill with said weapon, I could read their lips and discover what they were talking about, I could read their movements and predict five moves forward. So long as they weren't actively and skillfully creating a facade, I could see through them, and even if they did, all I had to do was to peer into their soul.

In the beginning of my journey, I absolutely refused to look into another's soul without permission. As time went on however, I was forced to use more and more to my disposal and became more pressed to use the ability to see souls. Eventually I was forced to due so in order to continue on without going hollow.

But when I did, it almost drove me insane.

At the time I had no idea what I was doing. I was going up against one of the most powerful warriors in Lordran.

Artorias.

_His attacks were erractic, and unpatterned. His movement was like that of the wolf he partnered with and was named after. But every hit he delivered showed the skill he gained after slaying dragons along side with his king Gywn. Each one of his hits shook the foundation of the arena we battled, and my shield could only just stand them. I knew just one slip and I would die._

_Like any good knight, when the fact that smashing his slab of metal he called a sword against my then dented shield wasn't working, he changed tactics. Artorias then started to spew corrosive muck from the abyss everywhere._

_With a combination of his swings and bouts of spewing acid destroyed my shield, forcing me to dodge to the best of my undead ability. Each hit missed, but not completely. After a barrage of hits, I was covered with shallow cuts and bruises. I was breathing heavy and I knew I had lost. I closed my eyes and waited for the inevitable._

_But then he did something unfamiliar. Instead of running me through, he roared out. Out of the slits of his helmet, his eyes glowed with an etheral blue. When I saw them, I remembered what I could do, and delved into the depths of his soul._

_I dug too deep. Instead of just looking at his immediate movements, thoughts and feelings, I fell directly into his soul._

_It was a dark, corrupted place. The Abyss had tainted his soul beyond repair. The darkness that those with the blood of gods could not withhold. It was twisted, full of every sin imaginable. It must have drove him and all others to explore the Abyss mad._

_Deep in the center however, a dim light was fighting to maintain itself in the darkness. It was a light unlike any other, and it had meaning. When I Gazed upon it, I realized what drove him._

_Artorias a mortal desire, something he would do anything for. He wanted to spar with his comrade who moved like lightning, he wanted to speak with the one whose eyes were that of eagles, he wanted to look at the world with the one whose tongue was as sharp as her sword. To reach out and pet the runt of the litter. Just like he used to._

_And when I Gazed into his soul, I learned every bit of who he was. His desires, his acomplishments, his strengths and weaknesses. But in return, he too got to see into mine._

_We stood still, looking at each other with newfound terror and respect. Seeing the world through his eyes had caused mine to change. The world of 'heroes' was not what I presumed it to be. Before, I was driven to continue on because of the prophecy alone. Now, I had nothing but questions._

_And I was going to get those answers._

_I took on a stance that I knew from heart. It was feral, like a beast, but I like it. It allowed me to go in any direction in a flash, and I could dodge even the greatest of archers. I learned it from Artorias after all._

_His eyes flashed in recognition. For a moment, the darkness around him lost its hold on him._

_"Thine soul... Truly it is noble..." He spoke in a slow, pained voice. "Perhaps... Thou can stop me... before I succumb to darkness... For even Orenstein... Could not stop me..."_

_Artorias reached for his chest, and ripped a chunk of his armor off and threw it to the side. The darkness that surrounded him came back full force. His eyes clouding up in madness, he looked at me for the very last time. "Please... Do it..."_

_And with that, his iron will was crushed under the effects of the Abyss. Once again mad, he let out a roar and pulled back his weapon._

_I knew what his next attack was going to be. Even if I only had a moment to react, the signs were as clear to day to me. He was going to do his signature move; The Wolf's Somersault Strike._

_I reached my hand down to my waist and felt rough wood. The Bottomless Box. Flipping open the lid, I immediately grasped the first thing that I felt and pulled it out. The Gargoyle Halberd. Tilting it up to the approaching figure in the air, I braced it against the ground and held firm. Seeing Artorias' sword coming down at me, I closed my eyes and waited._

_I heard a sickening squish, and I opened my eyes. My body wasn't split in half and I wasn't in massive pain, so I looked up. Extending beyond the grip of the halberd was a body. Artorias'._

_I shoved forward and he collapsed onto the ground, defeated. His helmet fell of and revealed a handsome face, black hair covering the ground beneath him. Despite all the years he fought, the only wound he received to the face was a large scar that covered the left side of his face._

_He got it for hunting down a group of wolves that once terrorized a local populace, I now knew. It was something that he could have gotten healed if he chose to do so, but he didn't. It was a reminder of his time among the wolves._

_He looked up at me, his eyes again clear. He was dying, and there was nothing I could do about it. But I knew he had excepted that fact, and I did nothing._

_"Thank you... Prometheus..." As he spoke his last words, his eyes glazed over and his body began to disintergrate into ash, and was whisked away in the wind, leaving only a darkened sliver where he lied down for the final time._

_"Artorias..." I whispered into the wind, "... Your sacrifice will not vain. I'll make sure of it."_

I kept that promise. I traversed the place the had melted Artorias' will of steel and found Sif surrounded in Artorias' final gift. I saved him, and together we entered Manus' realm and killed him. Sif immediately left, as his mission was done.

When I came back through the arena where the knight and I fought, I found Ciaran. It took all the will I had to stop myself from doing something stupid. It was another downside of Gazing into a soul, sharing feelings. I essentially adopted his soul into mine.

When she asked for his soul, however, I gave it to her. It was something to honor his name, and I knew the assassin would honor him more than I was able to.

After the encounter, I was far stronger than I was before, and I was tempted to once again try to Gaze into a soul, but the cons outweighed the pros. The only reason I survived was because his soul was not overwelming as it was similar to mine.

Anyone else, and I would've risked my soul being overrun. Perhaps that was the reason my soul was so dark, but I doubted it.

After all, worse things had happened to my soul.

* * *

I was walking the street where the bookstore I was newly employed in was. It was a fairly busy street, with shops, businesses and stalls lining both ends. They were heavily populated, at least in comparison to the streets full of mindless undead.

Something that I noticed almost immediately was the fact that there was a dense feeling of dread over the entire city, like the city was corrupted in some way. It was strange, as wasn't it natural for the emperors to ensure their subjects happiness? If not, they would have a problem with rebellions.

However, when I looked into areas where I would suspect activities against such a rule, I found nothing.

Perhaps it was just a monster like that lizard-cockroach thing from before. I let the feeling of dread go away and tried to focus on something else.

'Where can I get information quickly?' I thought, running a list of areas through my head. There were plenty of places. For example, a bazaar or plaza. However those commonly relied on trading information and I had nothing that I would be able to trade.

Except for weapons, but there wasn't any armories around the area I had scouted, nor did I believe that they would be as useful as Andre and the Giant blacksmith. Even Vamos proved useful for help, though I had to catch him on a good day and gave him plenty of weapons to work on.

But when I looked around, I found the best place to get information, whether in the previous worlds or in the current one.

The local pub. Or tavern, whatever they called it here.

Using subtle hints and drinking could get you all the answers you could find. It didn't work on undead like me though because our hearts didn't beat. I could now hide the my cold skin with my weird version of 'Fire Within', but how would someone react if they found out I had no heartbeat?

Speaking of bodily functions, what happened to the food I consumed? Sure, I could eat just fine, but when it entered my stomach, what happens? I never had to go to the bathroom nor did I feel like I ever needed to. My stomach needed blood to pump into it and mush the food together, right?

... Now that I think about it, those were questions whose answers I didn't want to know.

I began to walk towards the pub when I saw a notice board out of the corner of my eye. It was another place where you could find quick information, though some of it was biased and aimed to make people look the other way. I almost forgot of this thing due to all the time I spent in Lordran, as these types of things weren't around anywhere.

So instead of going to the pub right off the bat, I went and read the board. There were a bunch of hunt reward and job offers, but in the middle was something that caught my eyes the most.

"'Night Raid', huh," I whispered. According to the board, they were a group of assassins that killed high ranked nobles in the area. Out of an estimated twenty members, there were only three that were known: Najenda, Akame and Bulat.

Each one wielded a powerful weapon called a teigu, which was strange as it was a eastern word, and by the looks of the area it seemed like it was located in a western part of the world, though the geography of this land may have been different. It meant 'Imperial Arms', though the importance of the name flew over my head.

I doubt they could match up to my soul weapons though.

One of them however was a firearm, which surprised me. This place didn't seemed like it was in an era that created firearms, and even if they did I would've thought they'd make more advancements in technology by now. I added that to the list of things to investigate as I continued looking for information on the board.

Aside from a description of the three and their weapons, they showed a picture of each one of them. It wasn't that helpful, as the description was all that I needed. I could spot out who they were even in the dead of night, but if they put on a good disguise there was nothing I could pinpoint there.

I was trying to find anymore information when I felt the presense of a beast. A really strong one, just like a lion. I spun on my heels and reached down to my Bottomless Box and looked for for the source. It was strong, something I haven't felt in a century.

There. Off to the right side of the tavern was a blonde haired woman holding a sack over her shoulder. She was heading over to a nearby alleyway, so I decided to tail her.

While I should've switched into theives clothing, I thought that Chester's set would be quiet enough to follow. Walking briskly over to the alleyway, I tilted to the side and looked in. She was still walking down the alley like nothing in the world mattered. I fit one of my various masks on, the Mask of the Child.

Once she turned a corner, I dashed in to follow her. Peering at the alley that she went into, I saw that it lead to a dead end, and she was no where in sight. My instincts were tingling, but I put them aside for the time being. I walked up to the wall and stared at it for a moment.

My instincts flared up like the sun and I rolled forward, dodging what looked like a grab from behind. Tsk. Another one who could sneak up on me.

I got up and faced her. She was wearing a highly revealing black strap to cover her breasts and extremely small shorts. At her feet were a pair of battle boots and at her arms were furry and clawed gautlets. Her hair had become more wild and now sported cat-like ears on her head. I also noted that she no longer had the sack that she carried into the alleyway.

"Nice dodge," she said almost casually, though her stance was still tense. "Perhaps you could tell me where you learned to do that?"

I stayed silent and watched her carefully. Her stance was feral, just like mine in a way. Except hers was a little different. The way her feet were positioned, the height where she placed her head and how she let her arms down looked very familiar to me.

"Nothing to say?" She said, then she shrugged. "Fine. Then let me ask one last question: Why did you follow me?"

This was a question that I could answer without hesistation. "Your aura is that of a beast, so I was wondering what type of person would have that kind of aura."

Her stance tensed. "Well, it looks like you're gonna learn just what type of person I am."

And with that she sprung. Not at me, no, but instead she jumped up and climbed to the top of the building with her claws. She looked down at me and smirked.

"See you later!" With a wave of her hand, she fled the area at top speed.

By the time I reacted to her fleeing it was already too late. She had disappeared into the city and there was nothing I really could do about it.

I let out a sigh. That woman probably knew more information than I'd be able to find in the tavern, guessing by the way she went around the area and the look of her eyes.

Oh well, I guess I could just ask my employer about these things later on.

I cut my losses for the time being and decided to go back to the book store. I'd probably burn myself out if I got into more stuff like this. In more ways than one.

* * *

_Okay so that was the chapter. Yay. This chapter was divided into two sections, and this type of thing may or may not come back later, but the first half was to explain something that the CU can do, in this case a Soul Gaze. If you haven't noticed, I kinda took elements of it from the Dresden Files, if I haven't outright copied it. Sorry, but it fit what Dark Souls was, and I also needed a reason for the descriptions on items. The later half was back with the CU in the Akame Ga Kill universe._

_Unfortunately, this hasn't affected the length in any way. So you still have to deal with the 2000 words I normally write out._  
_Now since I got a fair amount of reviews last time, and currently don't have time to answer them one on one (because I'm kinda traveling right now), I'll just answer here in the author's note. So here:_

_Shuredda Sora: Well, at least that's what I'm trying to pull off, though knowing my constitution, I might not get there. With the CU being the CU, you'll get to learn if he's allowed to die and come back, later. I won't really answer that right now. As for the choice of armor, it was the armor that he was wearing against Gwyn. He wore it due to it's high protection and light weight, making it easier to dodge and move. It's not the game, so he couldn't roll around like a rock in full Havel's. Same with Artorias', along with the thing in the very beginning._

_Bloodrath:_ Maybe. He might get a harem, but I find juggling that kind of thing to be really hard, so maybe not. As for Akame, she's in the title of the original story. She's important enough that I'm not going to hold her down as a character just for a harem story.

_gh0st3:_ Erm, I have no idea what you're talking about. Can you send me a PM to tell me exactly what that's about? If I make a mistake I'd like to correct it as soon as possible.

_So yeah, those were all the reviews with questions. Keep the reviews coming, and don't be afraid to be harsh. The only critical reviews are coming from my beta-reader Sxilenced, and even then he doesn't say much._

_Well, I hope you enjoyed this chapter, and will continue to look forward to the next one, which will be 5000 words, I hope at least. This has been Joe, signing out!_

(This authors note added 400 words, so yeah. Oops I guess.)


	4. Exploring Hell : Aria Edition

_Dark Souls and Akame ga Kill belong to their respective owners. I own nothing._

* * *

I let out a heavy sigh as I lifted a stack of books into the back of the store. Working here was harder than I first anticipated, though I spent enough time in the archives that I should've realized that. Keeping order of a large amount of books was never the easiest task.

Pulling open the door to the storage, I placed the stack among their copies and wiped my brow. With the extra heat I wasn't used to working in and my constant hours, it tired me out a little faster than I was used to. That and the fact that I hadn't moved at all for one hundred years and was probably out of shape.

It was honest work though and I much preferred this instead of killing for money. It was far more statisfing than killing a mindless undead for souls. Granted, at one time I had felt like it was fine, but eventually I got bored of it. Call me a psychopath, but when you get stronger and more skilled, taking out mindless soldiers who maintain only a sliver of their previous skill was disappointing. Places like Blighttown and Sen's fortress had allowed me to further my skill, and when I finally made it to Anor Londo, the feeling was taken away as the giant knights there were able to crush me without even trying, again giving the feeling of powerlessness, and continued to train harder.

I left the storage room and looked out to see if there were any customers. None, at least not now. I went to the desk that was located near the front of the store and sat down. I thought about how things went the day before and the events of the day so far.

After the encounter with the blonde haired beast-woman, I decided to go back to the bookstore and look around. When I got back, Lubbock was gone, so I went and looked at his wares. They were all ordered in a way that allowed people to see what they wanted almost as soon as they walked in.

A small part of me scoffed at this. Weren't you supposed to make it so it was harder to find a product without help, making them spend more time in the store as to make more books catch their eyes and buy them? I shook my head and continued on.

After seeing that nothing was changed, I just went up to my room and began to make it more homely. A sword here, and a helm there made a big difference. It took some time before it looked good enough to meet my standards, and when I looked out the window I saw that the sky was darkening.

Knowing that no one would shop for a book late in the evening, I decided to go out and watch people go on by. Stepping out just beyond the entrance of the shop, I looked upon the streets with mild wonder.

While further down the street there was a darker, more haunted feeling, but now in the twilight people were a little more happy. More free, than they were in the light of day. This confused me a little, as it was in human nature to seek the light and not the darkness. But this place was strange enough already, so I chose to ignore it in favor of feeling the happiness that now bloomed.

The morning after, I 'awoke' before the sun rose and went down to the main floor. Already, Lubbock was dressed and ready for the day. After getting everything set up, he told me all the things that I had to do with the job, which included rolling up papers, signing paperwork and arranging books. After showing me, he then left, saying he had an 'important meeting with various store owners'. I didn't believe him, but kept quiet. Whatever he did during his free time wasn't something I wanted to intrude on.

Though if it dealt with a plan to further humanity in a way that was morally wrong I would probably figure it out faster than he could say "babes".

Which reminded me of something somewhat unnerving about him: He always had a slight glint of mischeviousness in his eyes whenever he saw anything resembling a female human. But again, I wouldn't pry into anything.

But whenever he tried to do anything with the small amount of female customers, I was sure to give him a good wack or two. Not too hard, but enough to remember. After the 20th time he finally got the hint.

I heard a quiet chime as the door to the shop opened up and another shoplooker came in, putting me back in the current time. Looking up, I almost started at the sight of the man in front of me. He was wearing a white suit all over his entire body. On his face was a gas mask and over his eyes were giant X's. Across his torso was a large three-fingered scratch. Though I was unable to see his eyes, his posture said that he was slightly nervous.

Seeing as he wasn't doing anything, and just stood there, I decided to try to get him to move.

"How may I help you, sir?" I said, putting on my most kind and helping smile. "Are you looking or a book here?"

It made him a little less nervous, and he became more relaxed.

"Um... I was looking for a book about dragons... for my child..." His voice was surprisingly soft.

"Okay, right this way." I lead him to the direction of the childrens book area.

There were plenty of children books about animals. From lizards, dogs and cats to high level danger beasts. They were all there, though most of the books about said danger beasts were about the dead ones, and the stories of those who slayed them. Probably propaganda too, now that I think about it.

I came across a book that was familiar to me. 'Puff the Magic Dragon' was it's title. I had read this book before, either in Seath's archives or in the previous world. It made me feel notstalgia, and much more older than any other person on the planet. In a way, I was.

The 'dragons' in the book were nothing like the ones in Lordran or the ones in the current world. The ones of Lordran could probably kill destroy the entirety of empire, even with their teigu's, assuming they had a reason to do so in the first place. The ones here though could only take out a small village or a small squad of men before being slain by some random hero.

Picking up the book, I flipped through the pages to make sure none were missing. All good.

"I recommend this one, though the dragons here are slightly different than the real ones." I showed him the book.

"I think she'll like that one," he said after a moment.

"Alright." I closed the book with one hand and went up to the front desk.

After checking the cost on the back, the masked man gave the apropriate amount of money. Picking up the book, he left the store in a relaxed state, being a lot less awkward than when he first came.

I waited a moment before peeking my head out of the store door. The man with the book was emitting an aura of happiness, it even stood out to the people passing him, who were affected and smiled with him. No doubt he was waiting for the look of his daughter's face.

I felt a small pang of sadness in my chest. I had a family, once upon a time. But it was so late for that. I left them, and there was no going back now. I shook my head to clear my mind.

Slinking back into the store, I sat roughly onto the stool behind the counter. Pulling out a used book, I began to read. I needed something to focus on.

* * *

The sun had long since set, and it was about time to close up shop. Looking around the entrance and seeing nothign that needed to be put away, I closed the door behind me and locked it. Lubbock hadn't yet returned, and I don't think he would be returning for a long while. His time card showed he would return in two weeks.

I trudged towards the back end of the store. There was a small alley that no one bothered to go in, even if they had something nefarious to do. It was the perfect place to set up.

Pulling off all of my clothing, I stood naked before reaching into my Bottomless Box. Feeling around, I finally grabbed what I was looking for.

The Xanthos set. It was probably the most rediculous thing that I had found in Lordran. With the golden cloth and weird wrapping-head-cast-thing, it was easy to think it was completely useless.

However, the material it was made of was incredibly tough, enough so that even Quelaag's Furysword was able to burn through it. It was also lightweight, making it easy to wear.

After quickly swapping it on, I stuffed my other items into the box. As a final precaution, I strapped Priscilla's Dagger onto the side of my belt. I wouldn't be bringing my sword as it was too heavy and affected my speed too much.

I secured the Bottomless Box to my belt after I got all my gear on. Leaving a bit of room between me and the wall, I gave a running start and planted my foot on the wall. Tilting my body up, I redirected the force horizontally, and I was launched up. Not quite all the way, I planted my other foot on the wall and reached up with my right hand.

Grabbing the ledge, I pulled up and hauled myself up. Landing lightly on my feet, I began dashing towards a nearby building. Coiling my leg muscles, I leaped through the air. For a split second of weightlessness, I felt elated. I hadn't done something like this in a long time. The last time I did was when a certain white phantom challenged me to a speedrun of the Cathedral scaffoldings. Then gravity came into effect again and I was running along tiles again.

Air whipping past me and the moon shining brightly, I began to map my surroundings. Almost all of them were built in a western style, and all of them civilian. There were some buildings that stood out, so I put a mental note over them. During the day I would check them out.

Jumping another roof, I didn't get very far when I felt something strange in my chest. I stopped and looked down. An ethreal glow was emitting from my chest. It was familiar to me. In fact, it happened whenever I killed something...

A sliver flew directly into the glow, and it disappeared. I snapped my head in the direction where the soul came from. It was a general one, and I couldn't pinpoint the location it came from. I was looking at a mansion when a soul came directly into view. There.

I burst into action, pulling my arms back and I flew off in the direction of the mansion. It was surprisingly modern, but I didn't bother with any more details. Reaching the last building, I jumped a distance not humanly possible. Quickly pulling out my staff, I cast the spell 'Feather Fall', and landed without injury on the inside edge of the tiny woods surrounding the building.

I reached down and pulled out two rings from my Bottomless Box. The Fog Ring and the Dark Wood Grain Ring. The Fog Ring had the ability to turn the wearer near invisible. It was useful for stealth, and I berated myself for not using it before. The Dark Wood Grain Ring had a special ability too. It gave the wearer an enhanced sense of balance, agility and flexibility. Given that I didn't move for a LONG time, I'd need it.

Crouching low, I snuck around the main court. Already I saw corpses littering the ground, three to be exact. The name Night Raid came to mind, and I could see why. The known hit list included only those with a significant amount of property and money, and no amount of silver writing could change that.

Reaching the backyard, I felt another soul enter my body. I fell back into the woods and sped towards the sound of conflict that began as soon as I entered. Nearing the site of a battle, I looked beyond the tree.

I found four people in front of me, though I knew that one was going to die within the next few moments.

To my left there was a girl with silver hair. She couldn't have been more than 15 years old; far too young to be in a combat situation. In front of her was a man, a soldier or perhaps a bodyguard. He was in his mid-30's, and maybe a little too large around the waist.

Off to my right, there was a young man with short brown hair and green eyes. He was kneeling on the floor, and was in the process of getting up. Something was familiar about him, but I ignored him in favor of the other one behind him.

She was of normal height, with a moderately slim build. Her hair was a long slicky black, and she had a pale complextion. In her right hand she held a katana, and it radiated danger that reached as far as where I stood. Her eyes, though, were blood red, and showed one thing: the promise of death.

She fit all the details. She was 'One Shot Akame', known member of Night Raid.

After that quick run through, I proceeded to watch the show.

The bodyguard had pulled out a machine gun, and it was blatantly obvious what he was going to do with it. I saw his finger twitch, and he pulled back the trigger.

In an instant response, Akame dashed forwards. Before the first bullet even left the gun, the area it was aimed at was vacated. Struggling to adjust with the recoil, the man resorted to spray and pray tactics, holding the gun at his hip and aiming in her general direction.

But she was just too fast. Still moving forwards, she would redirect her foward momentum in just the right angle, and continued on towards him without losing ground. The bodyguard got creative. He began to predict when and where she would go.

One lucky bullet began to head towards her head directly. Pivoting her body to her right, she spun around the bullet, and closed the distance with mind-boggling speed. Drawing her blade, Akame cut the man along his waist.

He didn't even get to close his mouth when his torso was severed completely off his lower body.

Blood splattering everywhere, her eyes remained the same. She still had something to kill. The brown haired young man managed to gain his footing, though he still looked a little dazed.

Akame approached the fallen form of the silver haired girl. She fell backwards out of fear and shock, and now had her eyes closed for the inevitable.

Akame raised her sword above her shoulder.

"Eliminate."

"Hold it!" The brown haired boy made a dash and clumsily made a horizonal slash. Akame easily stepsided the blow and backed off.

"You aren't a target." She said calmly, and held a tone as though she couldn't understand why the he was in the way. "There's no need to kill you."

"But you plan to kill this girl, don't you?" The boy asked as the girl behind him got to her feet.

"Yep."

"'Yep'?!"

"If you get in my way, I'll kill you."

"That doesn't mean I can just run!" He waved his sword around.

"Is that so?" Akame tilted her blade up to her face. "Then I'll just have to eliminate you."

The boy gulped, but still got into battle position.

"Ah, that was a mess!" A voice came from behind me. I didn't move, it was likely the person hadn't seen me. It too was familiar.

I turned to the side to see who came walked up next to me. It was her, the woman who managed to escape me the day before. She was relaxed though, and I didn't want to change that so I stayed still.

She gave a start. "Huh! Wait..."

She held a palm to her face. "How unlucky can a guy get?"

I focussed on the fight in front of me again. I could deal with her later.

They were at a standoff. They remained still, reading each other's movement.

And at an unseen signal, they ran at each other.

Closing the distance in the span of a second, they locked blades for the same amount of time. Pushing off each other, the boy recovered first and gave a slash. It was easily avoided with a jump, and Akame sent a kick his way.

It caught the boy on his left shoulder, knocking him off balance. Landing lightly on her feet, Akame dashed forward to deliver a killing stab. Too slow to react, the boy could only look on as the blade bit through his shirt...

And stop. It was blocked by something. The force behind the blow would have left him with a gaping hole in his chest, but instead it knocked him down.

"Tatsumi!" The girl cried out as he hit the floor. So that was what the kid's name was.

Tatsumi remained on the ground, as a trap. But Akame saw through that and remained on guard, and didn't approach. She noticed too. It befit her position as one of the best swords(wo)man.

He got up with a grim smirk.

"You won't even lower your guard and come near me?" He asked.

"I didn't feel any flesh." She responded.

Tatsumi let out a small laugh. He reached into his shirt and pulled out a small wood carved statue. He held it up.

"Everyone from my village protected me." He stated.

That was pretty good placement; it kept him alive after all. But now he was swordless and there was nothing he could do.

Akame raised her katana up again.

"Eliminate."

"Wait a minute! Aren't you guys after money? Let her go!" He held out his hands in protest.

Akame was already moving towards him at high speed. Lifting her katana once again, she prepared to strike.

"It's not like we're at war... Yet you're willing to kill an innocent girl?"

To my right the woman burst forward, with the intent of stopping her. I followed, but at a walking pace. I had no reason to rush like she did.

Just before the blade could cut his neck, the blonde woman pulled back her partner.

"Wait."

She dragged her back just enough so the blade swung harmlessly by.

"What are you doing?" Akame asked her friend.

"We still have time, right?" She asked in return, "I owe this kid a favor." She winked. "I figured I'd repay it."

Tatsumi got over his initial shock. "You're those boobs from earlier!" He pointed accusingly at her.

I almost let out a wince. There were better things to be known by.

"That's right! The beautiful lady!" She waved casually, accepting his insult like it was nothing. She turned serious. "Young man... You said something about killing the innocent, didn't you?"

The silver haired girl behind him noticibly flinched. She knew something. I remained on the sidelines, which is to say right smack in the middle while being invisible.

The blonde pointed towards the large stoarge building behind them. Tatsumi picked up and sheathed his blade and they all turned.

"Will you be able to say the same thing after seeing this?"

She walked past the two and went up to the iron doors. Lifting up her right leg, she smashed the doors open with a kick.

Tatsumi walked after her, along side Akame. The silver haired girl hesitantly followed after. I remained right behind her, just incase. They stopped at the entrance.

"Take a good look." The blonde said. "This is the imperial capital's darkness."

Standing tall above the girl, I could see into the darkness. It wasn't pretty.

All around the big room, bodies hung from the ceiling at various stages of decay. On the floor below there were various bodies ripped open and objects still remained inside of them. Lining the walls were large cages, and in each were bodies, frozen in time as they spent their final moments screaming in pain.

"Wh-what the hell is this?" Tatsumi said quietly.

"They lure people from the countryside with sweet words, torturing them and playing with them until they're dead." She said coldly, arms crossed. "This is what this household really is."

Tatsumi walked forward, slowly as though it were a dream. He let out a gasp.

"Sayo... Hey Sayo?" He said, disbelief clear in his voice. "Is that you, Sayo?" He reached out for a figure I couldn't see from my position.

"Is it someone you knew?" The blonde asked quietly.

The silver haired girl turned around and tried to sneak away. She bumped into my chest.

"Huh...?" That was all she got out when I grabbed her by the mouth. Pushing her down, I reared back and gave her shin a nice, good kick.

I heard a satisfying crack as I felt her shin met my foot. It wasn't enough to break, but enough to stop her from moving. I dropped her soon after, and she collapsed in tears.

She didn't even get to remain on the ground as soon after the blonde grabbed her by the head and lifted her back up.

"Aren't you asking for a bit much, trying to run away like that?" In response she blinked away the tears and gave a nervous smile.

"The people of this household did this?" Tatsumi asked, his voice now ice cold.

"That's right." The blonde replied. "Since the guards kept quiet, they were just as guilty."

"That's a lie!" The silver haired girl cried out. "I didn't even know this place existed.

"Will you believe the one who saved you or these people?"

It was a last act of despiration. I could see the way her eyes twitched and how she curled her fists. In her eyes there was a sick look of 'I don't deserve this'. It was disgusting.

My part done for the time being, I walked forwards and entered the building. The air was thick with the smell of blood and rust. I was about to jump down to look further when I heard something.

"Tatsumi..."

The voice was incredibly weak, and impossibly strained.

I looked in the direction of the voice.

"It's you, right, Tatsumi?"

The owner of the voice looked worse than that of the corpses that littered the place. He was stark naked, but his entire body was covered in a horrid red rash. Patches of decaying skin hung loosely of his body, and he was thin to the bone.

Despite that, he stood on his own two legs and reached out for a person that he knew.

"It's me..."

"I-Ieyasu?" Tatsumi's voice shook as he said his friend's name.

"That girl invited Sayo and me to her home." Ieyasu spoke. "And after we ate, we lost consciousness... And when we came to, we were here..."

Tears fell from his eyes in a constant stream. "Th-that girl tortured Sayo to death!"

With that, he lost his strength and slid down to his knees, hands ripping mercilessly against the rusted bars.

"What's so wrong with that?!" The silver haired girl slapped away Blonde's hand and backed away. Surprisingly, she managed to stand even with her horribly bruised shin.

"You're all worthless hicks from the country! The same as cattle!" She screamed as she finally broke. "I'm free to do whatever I want to them, aren't I? And that woman... Even though see was just cattle, her hair was smooth! Who does she think she is? When I struggle with my unruly hair!

"That's why I made sure that she suffered as much as possible! She should be grateful anyone paid that much attention to her!"

She began to giggle maniacally. Either from pain or insanity. Probably both.

"A family of sadists, disguised as Good Samaritans." Blonde whispered darkly as Akame drew her blade. "Sorry for getting in your way."

"Eliminate-"

"Wait."

The interuption came from Tatsumi. He was walking towards them, shadows covering his face.

"Don't tell me..." Blonde started. "You still want to defend her?"

"No..." Tatsumi grabbed the hilt of his sword. "I'll kill her!"

With a deft flick of his blade, he cleaved his sword straight through her chest, splattering blood everywhere.

The girl hit the ground in two different pieces as he sheathed his blade.

Akame stood, watching quietly while Blonde held a furred fist to her chin.

"That's Tatsumi for you..." I turned back to Ieyasu, now sitting down and crying. "That felt great!"

He suddenly lurched forward, hand on mouth as he began to vomit blood. Tatsumi turned back and ran for his friend.

"Ieyasu!"

Using his now bloodied sword, he cut the lock and opened the door. Going inside, Tatsumi lifted his friend out of the cage and gently layed him down on the metal flooring.

"Ieyasu..."

"It's the final stages of Lubora."

This time it was Akame, with her cold emotionless voice.

"The mother of the house enjoyed drugging her victims." She said. "And she wrote about it in detail in her diary.

"He cannot be saved."

Tatsumi remained quiet for a moment. While I felt that while I might try to heal him, there was no point since he was too close to death to even try. I highly doubt my mosses would help him, and they were mostly used for undead, as they had a high poison tolerance.

In other words, it wouldn't work for normal humans.

"Tatsumi..."

"Ieyasu!"

"Sayo... She never gave in to that bitch." Ieyasu's face was getting more and more covered with blood every time he spoke, but he chose to ignore it. "Even to the very end, she was so cool..."

He smiled. "So Master Ieyasu has to have a cool end..." He raised a bloodied fist to the air, and it fell. His face was still set in a grin, even in death.

His soul left soon after, and it left a silver trail as it entered my body. It was something only I saw though, because no one looked my way.

"It seems like he kept himself alive by will alone." Akame spoke up.

At this point I began to walk out of the area. I wouldn't bother looking at the aftermath.

Looking up at the mansion, I noticed a group of people standing there. Behind me, the three of them walked out... Well more like two of them walked, one was dragged along with them.

I melted into the shadows, and went to the front of the mansion. I heard words exchanged above me, but I didn't go up.

Soon I heard the noise of quiet footsteps leaving the roof, and saw Akame jump off into the night. Following her was a pink haired girl with same colored dress, the blonde, a young man with green hair with same coat...

Green hair!? Green coat?!

"Lubbock...?" I said quietly as another body jumped off. "... Goddammit."

I coiled my legs and ran right after them.

* * *

_..._

_Wow. I'm really surprised here. While I expected a little more traffic on this fic than my previous ones, but by this much? Dang._

_Anyway, I'm really thankful for the support that I'm getting for this story. It helps me whenever I write as I think of all the people I'll let down if I drop the story and I begin to hit myself to write. Though another factor is how bored I am, but that's not as important._

_I'm just gonna keep this one nice and sweet, and since there weren't any questions in any review, I won't be doing that._

_So, I hope you enjoyed and continue to look forward to future updates. This has been _Joe, _signing out!_


	5. Welcome to Night Raid, Mark!

_Dark Souls and Akame ga Kill belong to their respective owners. I own nothing._

* * *

The moon was shining dimly above me as I rushed through the forest. It gave an eerie light reflecting off the forest leaves, but it was enough for me to see ahead of myself even through the layers of fabric that the 'crown' I was wearing had.

I pulled into a very small clearing, and the moonlight shone down on me directly, gently revealing a hint of gold when I peered downward. Sighing, I plucked the Ring of Fog from my finger and put it back into my Bottomless Box. Then, I sat down.

I had followed the group I now knew to be Night Raid far beyond the borders of the capital city. They had far exceeded my expectations, both in speed and endurance. It could be compared to those of trained marathon runners; marathon runners that could win first place holding a sword and wearing military gear.

Though they could do that, I easily kept pace with them in my golden attire.

They weren't assassin's for nothing though, as whenever they melted into the shadows in became somewhat hard for me to keep track of them. At certain points I even lost them, and was forced to enter their mindset to once again find them.

Once they got into the forest, however, they disappeared into the night. I was then forced to go on and search all around the area for any clues of their passing. I didn't find any, so I decided to wait.

I was looking hard, but there was something holding me back. In Lordran, the Forests were fiercely protected by their guardians, human or other, while the moon had manipulated me while I looked for reasons. They left me with a severe distrust of both, though Artorias' memories managed to help curb that distrust just enough.

But that distrust was probably what saved me.

Tilting to the left, I flipped away as a spear passed the space the I had previously occupied.

Moving faster than a bullet, a wire whipped at my person. Taking advantage of the extra weight of the 'crown', I tilted back and narrowly avoided it. The thing I was wearing on my head didn't make it out as unscathed as I did, and suffered a minor cut.

In response I pulled out Priscilla's Dagger, and leveled myself into a hybrid stance between the Wolf and the one that I stole from the thieves of the Lower Undead Burg.

"Quite a big 'head' you've got there," my attacker said calmly, voice gruff. "Though I'm surprised that you even managed to dodge that in the first place."

He sent another wire at me, this time it came from behind me at my feet, meant to ensnare my legs. I hopped over it clearly, making sure I didn't touch the razor sharp wire. At the same instant, I pulled out a dagger and chucked it at my opponent. He leaned back and slapped the dagger out of the air with relative ease.

"So you were the one who was following us," he spoke as he readjusted his stance. "I had a feeling like we were being followed, but whenever we looked back we found nothing."

I remained silent. I always knew that they could have noticed, but I didn't have to tell him that.

"Nothing to say?" He said after my silence. "Fine. But that silence will be your last."

I flipped my dagger into a reverse grip and charged him. He responded in kind by pulling out his own knives and threw them in my direction. They were all a little off aim, so I continued without hesitation. A flicker of light caught my eye and I looked just enough to see it.

A wire. _Shit._

Immediately, I planted my feet into the ground and performed a front roll. The daggers changed direction in mid-air and targeted me, moving at the same speed they left their owner's hands.

I flicked Priscilla's Dagger up and deflected two knives away from my body. Using my other hand which was now planted on the forest floor, I rotated my body away from the remaining death implements.

I flipped backwards after, but felt a strange tug above my head as I did. The sound of cut fabric filled my ears as I realized what happened.

Somehow my opponent managed to sneak one of his wires around me, and attempted to behead me.

Landing back safely, my vision had cleared up significantly, due to the lack of cloth covering my eyes. As my vision came into focus, I saw my opponent standing still, shocked. I was in a somewhat similar state, though probably for different reasons.

"...Lubbock?" "...Mark?"

There was a silence between us as we stared at each other for what felt an eternity. Though my eyes rarely failed me, I had already chalked up the fact that I saw Lubbock as a trick of the light. Now, however, I found that he was actually part of Night Raid. It surprised me, which made me lower my guard slightly.

Apparently, that was all the opening he needed. Reacting in an instant, he lifted his hand and pulled. Suddenly several different wires came from all directions. With my lowered guard, I could only dodge the first four before the fifth caught my legs and another caught my arms and I fell onto the ground.

I thought about breaking or burning through the wires, but then chose against it when I looked up into my employer's eyes. No longer were they filled with blood, but a certain feel of tiredness, and no longer emitted murderous intent.

Plus, Lubbock was a nice person, giving me a job and board after just meeting me, so I didn't want to go and kill him.

He walked up to me and let out a tired sigh. "I guess I'll just have to bring you in. Though I don't really like taking in people, I'll make an exception for now. Come on, stand up, and don't even bother to run."

With that he threw one of his knives down and cut the wires holding my leg, freeing them. Slowly taking a stand, I began to follow Lubbock as he began to walk back into the forest.

I prayed I made the right decision. I still haven't found my first bonfire.

* * *

I was lead into a large castle-like building that was built into the side of a mountain. It was surprisingly well built, reminding me of Anor Londo, of all places.

We walked into the main hall, which was lit up in electric lanterns hung on either sides. All the walls were milk white, with red wood lining them. Again, the place was surprisingly modern considering that they still used swords as weapons.

Waiting for us were two people; the blonde cat-woman who ran away from me in the alley and stopped Akame earlier and a man with a black heart-shaped-drill-hair-thing. There was an empty chair at the end of the hall, but no one was sitting in it. I guessed that was were the leader would've sat, but they weren't there at the time.

"Look what the cat dragged in," the blonde said.

"Shut up, Leone," Lubbock bit back.

"So, who is this and why'd you bring him here?" The man with the drill hair asked as he looked me over with careful eyes.

'Dangerous, that one,' I noted as I looked into his eyes. His eyes showed more experience than either Lubbock or the newly named Leone, and were much harder. Already, I was putting him up among warriors like Solaire and Chuckles.

"Ah, this is Mark and he's a employee of mine," Lubbock answered. "I couldn't just kill him, I know him after all."

Leone's eyes lit up. "Well, can he fight? We already know that he has the stealth to follow us unnoticed."

"Well, he's here alive right? Isn't that enough?" Lubbock replied.

"I don't think surviving against you is something worth noting," Leone jabbed.

"Why you-" Lubbock started until drill hairs interrupted him.

"Enough you two," he said. Drill hairs turned to me. "I will test his strength myself."

Both my employer and his blonde friend looked at me with pity. Lubbock then sighed and Leone gave me a smile. "Don't be too rough with him, Bulat," she said.

With that the newly named Bulat began to walk towards another wing of the castle and I followed quietly behind. After walking a decent length through the building, we went out into a courtyard. The night light was gone, replaced with the light of early morning. My sense of time was distorted ever since spending time in Lordran, but I was still vaguely surprised.

Walking up to a rack that was leaned up against a wall, Bulat picked out two wooden rods, and tossed me one. The one that he was holding was the length of a spear, and the one that he handed me was the size of a sword.

We went into the middle of the field next to the rack, and distanced ourselves from each other.

Holding his staff in a defensive position, he carelessly spun his weapon around a couple times. His speed was amazing, something I noted to look out for when I fought him. Lowering his staff at me, he beckoned me with his free hand.

In response, I tightened my grip I had one my stick. Shifting my weight backwards, I positioned the stick directly at Bulat.

Wordlessly, I charged and the fight began.

* * *

***CRACK***

The sound of wood clashing against wood rang out once more as I was again forced to go on the defensive against the rain of blows from the machine of a man known as Bulat. The speed of his hits were but blurs in the air as I was forced to predict and move before he even rebound from where I had blocked before.

I noticed a tiny opening as he pulled back his staff and I immediately lunged for it. Shifting my weight back for extra leverage, I stabbed out with blinding speed directly for my opponents heart.

Noticing my attempt at skewering him, he switched into defensive as he batted my stick away. Using his gained momentum, he swung his staff toward my head, forcing me to duck down below it. Planting my free hand on the ground, I kicked off the ground and sent a kick off at his chest.

Instead of blocking, he parried the hit with his hand and delivered a kick of his own. Unable to dodge, I crossed my arms over my chest and absorbed the blow, sending me back three full meters. Twisting my body in mid-air, I managed to right myself and landed on my feet, already pulling up my wooden sword up to defend myself.

That is until I noticed my opponent had turned his back to me. I was tempted to close the distance and hit him over his head when I saw that there were two people talking to him. So instead of hitting him like I planned, I went over to see what they were talking about.

It had been three days since I'd first followed Night Raid back to their base. With nothing to do except to go back and collect the corpses of Tatsumi's friends to bury, they spent most of their time going around doing whatever to occupy their time until they got new orders.

One of those thing was fighting me.

On the first day, I managed to fight Bulat to a standstill after four hours of constant battle. He was fast for a human; however I felt that he wasn't putting in his full effort, something I could understand and did as well. You could only truly put in your effort if your life was on the line, or you were after another's.

However, I did note that he was far faster than I was. He pushed his advantage in speed, to which I responded with greater strength and skill.

Soon after I was asked to fight with Leone for a while, who had come back from collecting Tatsumi's friends corpses. She didn't have much time though, as she got sent another mission in the middle of our fight. None of them used their teigu's, but it was still an impressive feat in the eyes of the other members. I then decided it was time to rest, and spent the rest of the day unconscious.

On the second, I was allowed to look around the base, under supervision of course. Those watching me didn't do much thought, as once I found the forge I spent the rest of the day in there, doing whatever came into mind. I managed to smelt several daggers and other small weapons before retiring for the day.

The third I just spent by sleeping in the room that they gave me, not waking up for anything.

When I woke up that morning I decided to go out to the training area, and met Bulat there again. Thus, our fight.

By then I still wasn't exactly accepted by all of those in Night Raid, I managed to gain their respect, at least in close range and without

When I could see them clearly, I recognized the two who had watched our fight. To the right was Leone, who I had interacted enough to realize that she rarely took anything seriously and even fought for fun. To her right was Tatsumi, who I rarely saw, though I did see him go out onto the front area and bury his lost comrades.

And apparently they were making introductions.

"... The guy who was covered in armor when we first met," Bulat said in reply to something I didn't hear.

"Oh!" Tatsumi let out a gasp of surprise.

"It's Bulat, nice to meet you!" Bulat held out a hand.

"N-nice to meet you too!" Tatsumi said, accepting the hand and they shook in meeting.

"Oh yeah," Leone said, leaning close to Tatsumi with a stage whisper. "He's gay."

Tatsumi twitched and a sweatdrop formed on his forehead.

"Hey, hey..." Bulat said, face lighting up. "He'd misunderstand, right?"

There was a heavy blush on his face, and the sweat gathered on his face reflected brightly.

I let out a sigh. That was a part of his personality that I had long since gotten used to. In fact, I didn't even need that much time to as something similar to that essentially formed my bond with Solaire. I knew that Tatsumi was unnerved by it though, as his entire face got blanketed by a shadow and he looked like he was going to pass out.

"Ah," Leone spoke as she turned to me. "And this is Mark. He's the other new member that I mentioned earlier."

"Hi," I said, reaching out with a gloved hand. "Nice to meet you."

"Um," he was hesitant to accept now that he knew the person I was sparring was gay.

"Don't worry," I waved it off with my other hand. "I'm straight."

"O-okay," he accepted my hand shake. I gave him a tight shake and let go.

"So, what are you two doing? Looking around?" I asked as I turned to Leone.

"Yeah. I'm introducing Tatsumi to the rest of Night Raid today," she replied. "You wanna join us?"

"Nah, I don't really have a reason to right now," I said. "Besides, I'm heading down to the forge."

"Wait, aren't you gonna finish your fight?" Tatsumi asked me.

"I was going to lose, so I don't really have a reason to restart the fight," I said honestly. "Early in the fight I let my guard down, and that was all he really needed to gain the advantage."

"Well, make sure to come back," Bulat told me as I prepared to leave. "I'd like to have the extra practice."

"Sure," I turned away and began to head to a different wing. I raised my hand above my shoulder.

"Call me if you need me. Bye."

"Bye" "C'ya" "Chao."

I turned the corner and continued to walk until I made it to the meeting hall. As I walked by, I waved at Sheele and Mine, the first a tall purple haired woman and the second a petite pink haired girl. Both waved in return as I went directly into the hallway that went to the forge.

Once I got to the forge, I found that there were fresh material available. Not one to look a gift horse in the mouth, I immediately begin to use them to create weapons.

Smithing weapons and armor was something that I was able to learn during my time in Lordran. When I managed to cut off the drake's tail, I brought it to Andre. When I asked him to create a weapon from it, he laughed. Andre told me that dragon weapons had special properties, and only those who made them would be able to use them.

So under his guidance, I managed to create my first weapon : The Drake Sword. Early on, it was a weapon that I used a lot. It was by far my most useful weapon at the time, allowing me to deal with both larger opponents and groups of undead. But soon it became less useful as I gained more useful and more powerful weapons, and it became virtually unused, eventually resting in my Bottomless Box, never to be pulled out again.

Still, the process of creating a weapon from scratch was amazing to me, and I continued to learn how. Later on, in Anor Londo, I meet the Giant Blacksmith. There he taught me the way to imbue weapons with souls. Though he knew the way to create weapons from souls, it was something that wasn't as easily learned, taking on many decades of learning to even reach the first step.

That and it required some sorcery.

Though immortal, I didn't have the time nor the skill, so I never bothered. Now that I was free from the First Flame however, it gave me time to try and craft one such weapon.

I started with a base. Reaching into my Bottomless Box, I pulled out one of my several daggers I had made previously. Placing it onto the anvil, I lifted my hand to my chest. Feeling a slight tug, I pulled out one of the many souls I had inside of me.

Carefully bringing the soul down to the blade in front of me, I began to alter the shape of it, forming it until it matched the dagger perfectly. Then I inserted the altered soul into the blade.

Shining brightly, I lifted both my hands to protect my face just in case it exploded. It didn't. Instead, the light died down and I lowered my arms. Wiping the sweat that pooled up around my face, I looked down at my new creation.

It looked just like the dagger that it was before, except for some minor changes. Running along the blade were small, faint runes. Occasionally, you could see a flicker lighting them up for a split second, before disappearing. The edge was also a little bit more jagged, having more of a tearing effect.

Picking up the knife in my hand, I felt it tug slightly against my skin. It wanted more souls, to be imbued with more power. It was an aspect that was gained from consuming a soul, and would continue to ask for more power until it hit a certain point.

Then I would be able to decide if I wanted to give it an elemental aspect, make it more powerful as a base or make it better to use with specific skills. Simply put, reinforcement and ascension. You could repeat the process three times, before the weapon no longer needed souls.

There was also Titanite, which could be used as a substitute for a large amount of souls and speed up the process, which is why the blacksmiths of Lordran required it to upgrade weapons. Though eventually they became required if you wished to do the third cycle of reinforcement and ascension; the second if you wanted better results.

Thankfully, I had a good supply of those, so I had nothing to worry about for the moment.

Replacing the dagger with another, I began the long process of reinforcing. As I did so, I let out a sigh. It was going to take a while.

* * *

It had been several hours after I began on the anvil when I heard approaching footsteps. They were light footsteps, but not purposely hidden. Naturally light footsteps, from one of a small stature, or light weight.

When the person walked into the metal working room, I already knew who it was.

"Hello, Mine," I said in greeting, eyes never leaving the hot forge I was working on. I had long since finished reinforcing the new daggers, so I decided to move onto maintenance. I had finished with my main weapon, The Sunlight Sword, and just began fixing up my shield, or more precisely, Artorias' Greatshield.

"...Where did you get that?" Mine asked after a moment of hesitation. It was a very good question, seeing as I never brought it out before. It was large as well, being as tall as I was, and half as thick.

"I always had this," I delivered a hammer strike to emphasize my claim. It was true, just not in a traditional sense. I turned to see her response.

Mine let out a 'hmph' and turned away. "Whatever," she said, beginning to walk away. Halfway to the exit, she turned her head at me. "We're starting a meeting, and boss wants to meet you. Hurry up."

With that, she left. I stood up and tied my sword and sheath to my belt. Pulling a chain over my head, I secured my greatshield to back. Putting my repair tools back into my Bottomless Box, I left the room wearing Tarkus' Black Iron set, minus the helm. It wasn't the toughest nor the lightest armor in my arsenal, but it was very good at what it was meant to do : Intimidate and show status. It was also good at first impressions, something that I was aiming for.

I followed Mine into the meeting room, where people were already waiting in a semi-circle around the previously unfilled chair. The one who sat in the chair was a silver haired woman, who wore an eye patch and had a metal arm. I recognized her as Najenda, from a wanted poster.

That somewhat surprised me, as the prosthetic limb seemed to work perfectly as she moved the arm around like a normal one. I didn't ask about it though, and I was pushed into the middle along with Tatsumi.

"Alright, let's get this meeting started," Najenda said. "Bulat, report."

He stepped stepped off the wall he was leaning on and began.

"The mission started as planned," he said in a surprisingly serious tone. "Sheele had already eliminated her target by the time we let our presence be known."

"By then, the guards had moved out to confront us," Akame took over from an unseen signal. "Bulat and I took the front, while Leone snuck past and..."

I tuned the report out as I already knew what was happening next. Instead, I turned to gauge my fellow recruitee's - Tatsumi's - reaction. He looked a little bit shocked, surprised by how complex the actual plan was.

Beyond him, I couldn't help but notice something slightly more disturbing. A picture of Bulat. Not just any normal picture of him, no, he was completely shirtless, and in his mouth was a rose. Going a bit lower, I could see his-

I looked away, not trusting my own eyes and decided that for the sake of my nearly non-existent sanity I should refocus on his report, not his picture.

Why did it have to be in the meeting room?

"...However, when we left, we were followed back to base," Bulat stated, nearing the end of his report.

"And that person would be Mark here?" She pointed at me, eyes flashing dangerously.

"Yes. Lubbock was sent out to dispatch him after Mark set off one of his wire alarms, but seeing him as someone he knew, he restrained him instead of killing him," Bulat replied. "Personally, I can recommend him. He is plenty strong enough and skilled enough to hide his presence from us."

"I see..." Najenda clasped her hands in front of her in thought. "I understand the situation completely... Tatsumi, Mark... Would you like to join Night Raid?"

"We're dead if we decline, right?" Tatsumi asked, sweat beading his forehead.

"No, that's not going to happen... But we can't let you go back." Najenda replied. "We'll have you work as a laborer in our workshop.

"At any rate, you won't die even if you decline. Given that, what do you think?"

I remained silent and looked at my shorter counterpart. His eyes were dark and haunted.

"I..." Tatsumi started. "...Was planning to go out to the Capital and become successful to save my village, which is suffering from poverty... But even the Imperial Capital's rotting!"

"Tatsumi, the countryside's poor and suffering because the center's rotten," Bulat interrupted. "Don't you want to uproot the source of the rot?"

He flashed a winning smile. "As a man!"

"Bulat was originally a skilled Imperial soldier," Najenda explained. "But he learned of the Empire's corruption and became one of us."

"After all, our work is to eliminate the evildoers in the capital," Bulat said. "It's better than working under those rotten people." Despite his words, he was surprisingly calm, something I noted about him before.

"But, even if you just kill bad guys little by little, the world won't change greatly, will it?" Tatsumi questioned. "In the end, places in remote regions like my village won't be saved by that."

"I see," Najenda straightened. "Then Night Raid fits you even more perfectly."

"How come?" Tatsumi asked.

"Far south of the capital, there's a hideout of an anti-empirical force, The Revolutionary Army," Najenda explained.

I had heard of name before, but the other information was new to me. I shelved the piece of info into my mind.

"...Revolutionary Army?" Tatsumi whispered.

"The Revolutionary Army, which started out small, had grown into a large-scale organization by now," Najenda continued. "Then, inevitably a unit to handle covert jobs such as assassination and information gathering was created.

"That's us, Night Raid. Right now we're exterminating the capital's ticks, but in the event that the army takes action, we'll take advantage of the confusion, and the prime minister, who is the cause of the corruption—

**"We will take him out ourselves!"**

"Take out the Prime Minister...!?" Tatsumi asked, completely overwhelmed.

"That's our goal," Najenda concluded. "There are others, but I'll leave them for now. Although I can't say anything specific about when they'll rise to action...

"We've prepared a plan to win. When that time comes, this country will change for sure."

Silence reigned as Tatsumi thought over the new information. I had already made up my mind by then. I had already done what fate wanted me to do, and she left me in the flames. However, it seemed like Manus was once again reaching for his necklace from the Abyss.

I was sure as hell that being in this group would throw me into the darkest places, the places where Manus thrived. And when I find him, I will rip him limb from limb.

Just like days past.

"... Will that new country treat the people well?" Tatsumi asked, pulling me from my thoughts.

"Of course." Najenda responded.

"I see. Awesome..." Tatsumi said reverently. I could see the energy building up in him.

Not good.

"So the killing you're doing now is just targeting bad guys to clean out the trash..." Tatsumi started shaking in excitement. "In other words, you're assassins of justice!"

I looked skyward, palm pressed to my face and shook my head. What he's saying is that they are doing things morally right, and fair. Not even Solaire had any thoughts near this; he helped anyone regardless; as Solaire once told me, 'the sun shines on both saints and sinners'. Night Raid was more akin to the Darkmoon Blades, who were just there to add influence in the mortal side of things; to keep things in check.

Velka would forgive you for anything so long as you had the souls after all.

And by the laughing I was hearing around me, Night Raid had similar thoughts.

"Tatsumi," Leone said after breaking through her laughter. "No matter how you dress it up, what we're doing is murder."

"There's no way there's any justice in that." Sheele said.

"Everyone here could die at any moment," Bulat stated, "as retribution for our actions."

"Ah, how naive," Mine interjected. "Even in a century, he wouldn't be ready to join us." She turned away and started to walk.

"Wait," Tatsumi said, making Mine pause and look back.

"Huh?"

"I'm..." Tatsumi hesitated.

Najenda leaned forward intimidatingly. "Each person has his own reason for fighting but they're all prepared. Will your opinion still stay the same?"

"Will I get rewarded?" Tatsumi asked hesitantly.

"Yeah," Najenda said back. "If you work properly you'll be able to save your hometown"

"Then I'll do it! Let me into Night Raid!" He regained his lost energy. "If it's for a big goal like that, Sayo and Ieyasu would have done the same!"

"You know, you might not be able to return to your village," Mine told him.

"That's fine," Tatsumi said. "As long as everyone in the village can be happy through that."

"And how about you, Mark?" Najenda turned to me. "You haven't said anything."

"I have no problem with following orders, so long as I have my freedom," I reply blandly.

The leader of Night Raid looked into my eyes. I stared blankly back, no emotion showing through.

She let out a short sigh. "I'm not going to get much out of you, am I?" She asked rhetorically.

I shrugged; it's just the way I am.

"Alright then, you have your reasons," Najenda said, regaining her composure. She reached out a hand.

**"Welcome to the path of carnage."**

* * *

_..._

_Yeah sorry for the slow update this time, but I can explain it._

_1.) Computer crashed, erasing 2000 words, not fun. Then it did it again. Yay._

_2.) Travel. Lack of internet, planes and jet lag do things to your updating ability._

_Yeah those are the reasons. There is a little bit more, but those only lost me less than 10 minutes at the most._

_Also, 50 favorites and follows! That's more people than I could ever bother to meet at one time, much less talk to. Still, I like the support, and will continue to update when I can._

_Now for my random rambling that doesn't really matter:_

_From something I heard from another writer on here on fanfiction, I decided to look at other AgK crossovers..._

_They're kinda bad._

_From weird OOCness that could easily be avoided by just another crossover fic from the motherverse, to completely strange explainations and Naruto crossovers, most of them are bad. Just saying._

_On another note, most fics from the big shows tend to rely on audience rather than actual writing quality. For example : some of them might have horrible story lines, broken power levels and formatting that looks just wrong— and have more than 500 favorites. Of course, there are ones that are absolutely deserving of their 1k+ favorites._

_And that's all I have to say, because I don't really know where this story is going now, but so long as I get my Esdeath vs. Chosen Undead fight scene(s), I'm good._

_So, make sure to leave a review, and I'll catch you later!_

_This has been _Joe_, signing out!_


	6. Kill the Peace

_Dark Souls and Akame ga Kill belong to their respective owners. I own nothing._

* * *

_**Okay, this may seem a little weird, but from here on out I'll be putting the author's note up here, and there are reasons for doing so.**_

_**Firstly, it allows me to put out information out to my readers to prevent them from being confused by all the canon bending I'll inevitably end up doing, as is the nature of a crossover. And yes, canon will change; people will live and people will die.**_

_**Secondly, it makes sure that those who review can get an understanding of something that they might've missed or anything like it.**_

_**Now for the actual information giving. (WARNING, SPOILERS AHEAD, SKIP IF YOU DON'T WANT ANY.)**_

_**For most of this chapter, it's mostly showing off the interactions of Night Raid together, plus the addition of Mark. It is really dialogue heavy, and mostly from the original source, with some extras added in. You can also see that Mark is opening up a little, though to what degree is up to debate.**_

_**However, the last part is the one that most of you will be asking about, and hopefully I'll be able to answer the questions before hand.**_

_**The Dark Hand. During his time in Lordran, Mark has obtained it, but not from the covenant. In fact, he has no connection to either Frampt or Kaathe. However, it has added effects that weren't in the game. One, the Dark Hand deals massive damage and robs large amounts of humanity. Two, it can tell when one of the Darkwraith's invade their host. Think of it as a parasite.**_

_**Another would be the Dark Spirit that invaded. It's mostly showing off that there is something happening in the world of Akame ga Kill, and it's connected Dark Souls universe. It will also add something to challenge the Chosen Undead, because to be honest only a few characters can match his strength, and that's without him using all of his Pyromancies, Miracles and Magic.**_

_**And he's not going out unharmed :P**_

_**(SPOILERS END)**_

_**Anyway, its been a long time since I've last updated this story. That's because school season has started and I don't have as much time as I did over the break, along with extra activities I've been doing. But don't worry, this story isn't dead, and I'm not planning on killing it anytime soon. I just hope it doesn't die like the rest of my stories.**_

_**So here are some reviewer responses:**_

_**Templarsith: I'll be doing something similar, so don't worry.**_

_**Kaioo: He's rusty.**_

_**ArmorOfGeddon: I've already talked to you about this, but it seems like I've found a different way to make him trusted by Najenda and the rest.**_

_**Mastermind and Guest: Maybe.**_

_**gh0st3: Once again, I have a slight idea of what you trying to say. One, what's a firebone? Two, what he's good at is swinging around extremely large weapons for hours. Three, whhhhaaaaat? and Four, you probably have never played a souls game before, have you? I totally recommend them, as long as you can withstand getting killed more than you can count. But seriously, all of those I'll explain how they'll work, but just later. I already know what I'm going to do with them, so don't worry.  
**_

_**And that's all of them. Special shout out to my Beta Sxilenced, who edits this and proofreads them. I would also recommend his story Grima's Renegade, as it is FAR better than anything that you can find from me.**_

_**I hope you enjoy the read, and this has been **_**Joe, _signing out!_**

* * *

I lifted the knife upwards, feeling the familiar weight in my hand. With practiced ease, I brought it down, slicing the air. It bit cleanly through the carrot, separating the organic material with cold steel. Tilting the knife at an angle, I flicked the bit off into the air, where it landed safely in a bowl.

Repeating the process multiple times, the carrot became nothing more than tiny pieces to be cooked.

I picked up the bowl and emptied its contents into a pot of boiling water, and picked up a small towel to wipe my hands.

Nearby, Tatsumi was peeling an apple, and beyond him was Akame, endless picking from a grapevine.

I could feel his frustration building up, and he was going to relieve it in some way or another. I let out a sigh and prepared for the imminent burst.

It had been a couple days since Najenda came back. During that time, she assigned Tatsumi and I to work under Akame, as 'training'. I knew that it was a way for Tatsumi to get integrated and to test his will, but for me it was different.

I was being constantly supervised by Akame, and if I did anything out of line, she had orders to kill me. Najenda did not try to pry me for information, but I had no clear reason to fight the Empire. She had all rights to be wary of me, and I understood that.

Looking over at Akame, I felt a little worried. Though I was stronger and more skilled, Bulat was able to fight me to a standstill with his superior speed. Her speed was at least on par with his, if not better, and in a small space like the kitchen it would take no effort to kill me. She also had never once released any killing intent, even when she killed a guard, so I would be caught off guard if she decided to kill me.

The most worrying factor was her weapon. It was a weapon that felt like the blood it shed over the years. I could essentially feel the poison that leaked from the blade, and I knew that it was highly dangerous.

Murasame : The One Cut Killer. It had extremely potent poison, which immediately spread to the heart and around the body, killing it within seconds. However it was said that it would only work on something with a beating heart, which I happened to lack. The death that reeked from the blade uneased me, making me compare it to Nito's Miasma.

I was not willing to test the blade if it came to that.

And so with that threat, I was put in the position of cook along with Tatsumi and Akame, which was something I admittedly missed doing.

I turned back to my work and picked up another carrot as Tatsumi finally opened his mouth.

"Dammit!" He cursed. "I'm supposed to be an assassin, but day after day, I'm cooking!"

"It can't be helped," Akame said calmly, eating another grape as she did so. "After all I'm in charge of food."

"You're in charge of food so you can snack on everything, huh?" Tatsumi stated bluntly, frustration giving way to his inner snark.

"That's not true," Akame replied, eating her seventieth grape in the past two minutes.

"That's not remotely convincing," Tatsumi sighed. I grunted in agreement; Akame could consume the fill of ten men, and burn it off in a single day.

"Those outfits really fit on you newbies," a voice hinted with scorn came from the entrance.

"What did you say!?" Tatsumi turned, crushing the apple in his hand.

"Good morning, Mine and company," I greeted, cutting another carrot without looking up.

"Hey, you two," Bulat greeted back. He was leaning against the arch, and along with him was Mine, Lubbock and Sheele.

"Bulat," Tatsumi said, who stood a little straighter. "Huh? Are you all going somewhere?" He asked.

"Yeah, we're on an emergency assignment," Bulat told us.

"An assignment?" Tatsumi said with confusion. "What about us?"

"The newbies can stay home!" Mine jumped at the chance to deliver her usual scorn. "Just keep chopping those cucumbers or whatever!"

"Don't worry," I said as Mine started laughing. "She's just asserting her masculinity over us, a standard mating tactic."

That shut her up. I smirked as Mine's and Tatsumi's faces lit up with laughter lighting up from the rest of Night Raid. Mine's embarrassment quickly changed to anger however, as she realized I just called her a man.

"Why you...!" She began to charge me, only to pulled back by Bulat, who was still laughing. "Let go of me, you idiot!"

"We have a mission to do, Mine," Bulat said with a smile. "Come on, we're going now."

With that fun little moment over, Bulat dragged the raging Mine along with the rest of their group to get to their mission. I could still hear her cursing me even as they left the area, the echos booming loudly across the circular halls.

"Even Mark's messing with me," I heard Tatsumi mutter in embarrassment and slight humor.

I tossed the now chopped carrot into the pot and moved onto cutting lettuce. The air was once again filled with the sound of chopping and water boiling as we worked in silence.

Then Tatsumi stopped, and looked over at me.

"Oh yeah," he said, eyes curious. "Why did you join, Mark?"

I stopped chopping and held my head with a hand, in thought.

"I came here from a faraway land," I started. "Perhaps further than any other living being has ever come from."

This perked Akame's interest, who stopped eating to listen with Tatsumi.

"I had to kill many danger beasts, some of which you've never seen, at least from what I got from Lubbock's bookstore." I turned back to the lettuce and began cutting again.

"That far away...?" Tatsumi whispered. "Why did you come here, to the capital?"

"I suppose I can let you two in on my little secret," I said, knowing for a fact Akame would report what I was going to say.

"I have to ability to sense 'dark' intent. I guess you could can me a clairvoyant." I slid the diced lettuce onto a plate and picked up another.

"When I ended up near the border of what you call the 'unexplored region', I sensed large amounts of dark intent in this area. So I decided to investigate. And I found a place full of corruption and sin."

"Wait," Akame spoke up. "How do you know the concept of corruption and sin if you grew up in the wild?"

I smirked. "That's under the assumption that beyond the 'unexplored region' is 'wild'. The world's a lot bigger than you might think, and that's not even going under water or earth."

I picked up a grape, ignoring the shocked silence of the other two. The base of it was a lie, but the rest relied on fact, such as the fact that I was actually clairvoyant to some extent, like all undead. I popped it in my mouth, savoring the taste.

"Mmm... That was good."

* * *

We walked up the mountain side to a secluded area, each one of us carrying a basket. Walking a little bit further, I spotted a clearing.

Entering it, there were several waterfalls running down the side of a cliff, the water source of the a large and deep lake. The area was well lit in the early morning sun, and the water was completely clear, no pollution in sight.

"We've arrived," Akame said, placing her basket on the ground.

I walked up to the edge of the cliff and put down my basket, admiring the sight. It had a certain air around it that aroused feelings of calm, something that I found appealing.

"Wow..." Tatsumi spoke, standing off to my right. "It's nice here."

"Indeed," I agreed easily.

"Today, we'll gather our prey from here," Akame said, pulling off her necktie as she did so.

I turned away and gave her some space, sitting down next to the edge.

I heard Tatsumi panic and fall over as clothing dropped to the ground in a heap, something that could easily be taken out of context.

"Why are you panicking?" Akame said dressed in a swimsuit, standing near the prone Tatsumi.

"Huh?" He said as he looked up at her. He let out a sigh of relief. "Oh, you're in a swimsuit."

"Our objective today is Koga tuna," Akame said, walking past him and standing at the edge of the lake. "This is the best location."

"Aren't those the mysterious, rare and vigilant fish?" Tatsumi asked.

Akame jumped off the cliff side and performed a dive, landing cleanly in the water. I saw her swimming deep under, to the point where I could no longer find her.

After a short moment, she swam back up with three large fish in her arms, and casually tossed them out of the water, landing perfectly inside of her waiting basket.

I admit, it was a rather interesting way of fishing, and rather skilled as well.

"Dive into the depths of the lake, and mask your presence. The moment your prey comes by, attack. Commitment is the key," Akame told us, head bobbing just above the water. "Can you do it?"

Tatsumi let out a 'hmph' and smirked. He stripped off his shirt. "Bring it on!"

I shrugged. "I can't swim," I admitted.

Tatsumi looked back at me, arms raised with energy. "Wait, you can't?"

"Water is my weakness," I told him. "I sink like a rock regardless of what I do."

I pulled out the Black Bow of Pharis from my bottomless box. "I'll be hunting with this."

Tatsumi stared at me. "Where'd you get that?" He asked. His face became slightly clouded with sad memories before he forced it down, hiding it beneath his forward innocence.

"I always had it," I replied, pulling out a thin wire I borrowed from Lubbock and tied it to the back of an arrow from the box.

I ignored him as he continued to stare at me with slanted eyes and stood up on the edge of the ridge.

Nocking the feathered arrow, I pulled back the string until it held tight. Looking down into the water, I found a stray fish swimming deep under the surface. Angling the bow just above the image of the fish, I released my grip on the string and the arrow flew with the speed of a bullet.

The arrow pierced the water and dug into the fish with relative ease, entering the spine and killing it instantly. Before too much blood could be released, I jerked back the wire I had tied to my arm and the fish flew out and landed in my basket.

"..." I looked down as the blood from the fish rose up to the surface. "I don't think that was such a smart idea."

Tatsumi let out a sigh. "Just don't kill us with that thing." With that, he jumped into the lake, following in Akame's footsteps.

* * *

"So..." Najenda started picked up a piece of fish with her chopsticks. "In the end Tatsumi only caught two fish, and Mark only got one..."

"I heard you tore your clothes off and yelled, 'bring it on!'" Leone took a stab at Tatsumi, then turned to me. "And you can't swim?" She let out a little burst of giggles.

"You're still far too naive," Akame said, eying the giant fish head she held in her hands.

"Not completely true," I said, picking up my own piece of fish and eating it. "Mostly just untrained."

"Like you did any better," Tatsumi grumbled.

"Just wait until you see me hunting birds," I replied.

His face twisted in the weird way it always did when he had thoughts about someone. Usually dark thoughts, I might add.

"Then, Leone," Najenda paused from her eating to look at her. "Let's hear your job."

"Alright," She said, moving the food away and pulled out two pieces of paper. "The targets this time are Orge, of the Imperial police, and Gamal, an oil merchant.

"Gamal has been paying Orge a huge amount in bribes. Whenever Gamal commits a crime, Orge creates false evidence and frames another," Leone pulled out a sack of coins. "This is the payment."

"That's a lot of money," Tatsumi said, leaning forward to get a better look.

"I caught the scent of a venereal disease," Leone said darkly, and I winced. "She probably sold her body many times to earn this."

Tatsumi flinched. "No way..."

"Have you verified the case?" Najenda asked, pulling out a cigarette.

"I've check with my own eyes and ears," Leone reported. "They're guilty."

I lit a small flame on my finger and offered it to Najenda. She looked at me surprised.

"Bar trick," I explained, which was half true. She eyed me before nodding and lit her cigarette. She took a short puff, and satisfied, continued on.

"The Night Raid accepts this case," Najenda spoke. "We won't need any abhorrent garbage in the new country. We shall bestow divine punishment."

"The merchant, Gamal, should be easy," Leone said. "But Orge will be a formidable opponent.

"Orge, the demon. He's a highly skilled swordsman that even criminals fear. Normally, he's surrounded by lackeys, and is rarely alone," Leone informed. "Additionally, he's cautious. When accepting the hush money, he invites Gamal into his room. When he's off duty, he drinks on mainstreet."

"It seems when he's off duty is the only time to strike," Tatsumi noted.

"But the police are strict in the vicinity of the Palace," Najenda said. "It would dangerous for someone like Akame, whose face is publicly known."

"Hey, hey!" Leone stood up and raised her hand. "I'm not on any wanted posters!"

"Can you do it?" Najenda inquired.

"The stronger the enemy, the more I'm up for it!" Leone exclaimed.

"Why not wait for Mine and the rest?" Akame asked.

"But we don't know when they'll return, right?" Tatsumi said.

Akame nodded.

"Then, let's just do it ourselves!" Tatsumi slammed a hand on the table.

"Oh?" Najenda was impressed by his bravdo. "Are you saying you'll defeat Ogre?"

"Eh?" Tatsumi got confused.

"Yeah, that was some big talk..." Leone smirked at him. "You'd better take responsibility for those words!"

"Right now, this job is beyond you," Akame bluntly stated.

"I'm also skilled with a sword," he said back.

"I'm saying that you won't be able to kill," Akame replied.

"But I've experienced..." Tatsumi dragged off.

"You swung your sword out of hatred," Akame said. "Are you saying that you can kill without hesitation, at any time?"

His hands clenched. "Even while we sit here... Other may get framed, right?" He raised his head. "If that's so, I'll do it! Beloved people being taken away for stupid reasons... I don't want anyone to feel this way!" He exclaimed.

"Then it's decided," Najenda stubbed her cigarette. "Tatsumi, go kill the demon."

"Nicely said, Tatsumi!" Leone praised, giving him a light slap over the head. "You show great resolve!"

"Leone and Akame, deal with the oil merchant," Najenda told them.

"Got it!"

"Understood."

Akame stood up and began to walk towards the entrance.

"How's that, Akame?" Tatsumi said suddenly. "When I take a stand, I do it seriously."

She held her silence before opening her mouth. "After completing your task and making your report, you'll be considered legitimate." She turned her head to look at him out of the side of her head. "At this point arrogance will only result in death."

Akame turned and left the area. Tatsumi simply looked at the ground, a conflicted look plastered onto his face. Then he blinked, and looked up at me in surprise.

"Wait," he said. "Why isn't Mark coming with us on the mission?"

"That's because I'm not needed," I said, leaning back in my chair. "Besides, I was going to go out and look for more materials for the forge."

I had actually discussed this with Najenda beforehand, and got permission to do so. There was also another reason, but it wasn't something I wanted to share.

"Speaking of the forge," I reached a hand to my belt and pulled out a piece of Titanite. "If you manage to kill Orge, I'll teach you something."

"Really?!" Tatsumi asked, excitement blooming on his face.

"Really. Just make sure to survive, alright?"

"Don't worry, Mark! I've got this!"

"Alright then, see you guys later."

I waved at them and left.

* * *

I pulled back the string, the feeling of intense strain going through my arm. I drew it out to my side, arm outstretching all the way out. I held it that way for a couple of seconds, the pull of the bow threatening to snap. Then I returned the string back into place, slowly and patiently.

I reached into my Bottomless Box and pulled out one of my Dragonslayer Arrows. Nocking the arrow, I pulled it back and rested the tip on my finger, and held it there for a while.

Calling Dragonslayer Arrows 'arrows' was a joke. The size of the 'arrows' were the length of a sword, and the thickness of a club, and maybe three times heavier. The damage capability made up for that though, as it could easily punch through any form of armor, from the Giant's armor, and even the immortal scales of the Everlasting Dragons, as the name would suggest.

And I would know; I slew an Everlasting Dragon with the help with one.

I closed my eyes and felt the world around myself, something that I had once done unconsciously, but with a century of inactivity it would take a while to re-adjust. It would take a while before the instinct came back, so I spent the time away from the rest of Night Raid to hone it.

Taking a several kilometer trek into the uncharted forests was one way to do it.

I felt a slight tremor in the upper branches above me.

Instantly, I tilted the bow up and let the arrow fly. The string snapped back with lightning speed, the recoil pushing the Great Bow off the ground after it left. The arrow screamed as it flew through the air like a bullet, as if detesting something as large as it could even be used as a projectile.

A wet smack rang out, and I opened my eyes. A large mass that was a bird danger beast fell from the sky, silent as it was killed instantly.

I charged ahead, knowing exactly where my prey would land. The forest around me burst to life, with flocks of birds fleeing their homes, as though it realized that one of their own was just got killed.

I twitched my bow to the right, deflecting a rock and pulled back the string. At full draw I released, another arrow ripping through the air. It found it target in one of the living trees.

Before I could nock another arrow, one of the tree beasts went behind me, stretching its long tendrils of wood to grab me. I grabbed an arrow and threw it, jumping over the offensive limbs at the same time. While not as fast, it did the same effect, shredding the tree to pieces.

I rolled off the force, dodging three of the tree's attacks. Pulling up the bow, I fired off shots in quick succession, leaving them in pieces.

I jumped up as a giant open jaw came up from the ground. Twisting in mid-air, I threw two daggers at the birds who began to dive at me. The Earth Dragon swung its right arm to hit me. It passed harmlessly over my head as gravity took effect and I grabbed it.

Flipping on top of the offending arm, I ran up the length of the arm until the elbow. With the precision of a craftsman, I planted an arrow on the Dragon's elbow, and delivered a kick. Blood erupted from the wound as the arm was severed cleanly.

The Dragon roared in rage and punched with his other hand in rage, attempting to crush me. Instead to moving away, I picked up the arrow used to sever the arm and nocked it. Just before it could land, I flipped to the side, the giant arm digging into the ground behind me.

I smiled as I nocked one last arrow, and aimed directly at the Dragon's head. The look in the creature's eyes was of fear, something I thought was impossible for the Danger Beasts. It ended however, when the arrow pierced straight through the Dragon's hard armor, and it fell.

I sensed around me, looking for other creatures aiming for my demise. So I began to approach the Dragon with the intent of taking it's armor and soul, which lingered gently over the limp corpse.

But then I stopped, as the world began to slow down. I fell to my knees as the trees around me warped and twitched in different directions, my head a swarm of pain. It was familiar, but it wasn't something that I could remember. Another flash of pain erupted in my hand, and I scream in pain. I lifted my left hand up to support my head…

No.

I growled as I stared at my hand. It floated like a ghost around my hand, turning erratically and without pattern. It was a dark amber, like a frozen flame. It suddenly flashed black, sending another wave of pain through my body. It was something I never wished to see again.

The Dark Hand.

It was the 'gift' granted to those the sought out the power that the serpents from the abyss, and it possessed great power. It gave their wielder the ability to steal humanity from others, by way of puncturing the chest directly, and ripping out the heart where their host of humanity remained. It slew all but the hardiest of people, and even then they were weakened by the loss.

The additional humanity would help out that undead, that Darkwraith; however the humanity gained that way was not the best. It was addictive—worse than any other substance I'd ever seen. It made the crack addicts you could find on the street look like calm gentlemen. It drove them mad, wanting more and more each time. Some even managed to earn more than what a fire keeper could withhold, but they continued to hunt down more, leeching off the various undead that were sent on a mission.

I had witnessed their brutality, their tactics and strength, and it was not something that I wished to see again.

However, it looked like my wish would not be granted.

My eyes narrowed as I heard an all-too-familiar sound of wind dispersing. I stood, the pain leaving my body as I hung the Dragon Slayer bow on my back and reached into my Bottomless Box, my left hand already holding Artorias' Great Shield. My left hand twitched into black once more, leaving not a trace of doubt in my mind.

And then the Forsaken Words boomed out, louder than even the loudest shout, spreading beyond the lands like lightning; yet at the same time quieter than even the ghosts that haunted the world. And it was terrifying.

**_CURSE BEARER CADMUS HAS INVADED YOUR WORLD_**


	7. Old Enemies From Times Past

_Dark Souls and Akame ga Kill belong to their respective owners. I own nothing._

* * *

**_JEEZ, it's been far too long since I've updated. To be fair, I was pretty busy. School, Dark Souls 2 DLC, Family, Dark Souls 2 DLC, AGG, Dark Souls 2 DLC, reading other material, Dark Souls 2 DLC..._**

**_The list goes on and on._**

**_So for those who were looking forward to this chapter, I'm sorry as this probably isn't my best work. As of the time I'm writing this I'm still quite busy with the above list, so I hope you won't hate me for that._**

**_Any way, onto the *SPOILERS*:_**

**_The Fight: The Chosen Undead is really, REALLY strong, but even he can get injured due to a lucky shot or nature. Now if this was something that effected all characters, that would be amazing. However, I'm trying to make this a little different, so look out for that. Eventually he will die, and it will be glorious._**

**_The Play Fight: Because CU earned all their souls, he will probably know how they work. I hope to do something with the souls eventually, so you'll just have to wait for that._**

**_Bottomless Box: Read below for something more meaningful. Please._**

**_*SPOILERS END*_**

**_Wow that was short, and probably unneeded. Oh well. Now for some actual discussion. Something that I noticed early on is that all the characters are idiots. EVERY. ONE. OF. THEM. Well, except for Run, Susanoo, Chelsea and Esdeath. So if I want to write them as they are, I need to keep their intelligence as it is. It hurts, but it actually makes it easier for me to write them._**

**_So I hope you don't mind._**

**_Finally, Review Reading and Answer:_**

**ThisWriterIsFalse: _Up above, please. All the answers are there._**

**Altair hellscream: _YAY! I'M HERE! I don't think I'm the best crossover though. I like the Ranma 1 1/2 one. Though to be honest, the titular character's strength is WAY Marty Stued, considering Ranma can get knocked out by Ryoga in one hit, versus a woman who can clearly kill hundreds of people twice as strong. Still a good story, but that's my main problem with it. AND now I should stop before anymore flames come on through._**

**_So thanks to all that favorited or followed or left a review. I hope you enjoy my rather short chapter, and this has been _Joe, _signing out for god-knows how long!_**

**_Also, _TAKAHIRO HOW COULD YOU?! NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOooooooooooooo-  
**

* * *

He rose out of the ground in front of me, the black circle killing all the grass underneath. His presence flashed out, and he opened his eyes.

Pure darkness. Just like the rest of his kind.

He was wearing armor that I could not distinguish at all, something that made me extremely weary as I could normally recognize armor even in the new area I arrived in. He wore a cap that had a large feather protruding out the top. His face was covered with a mask, the eye holes stitched together in an eerie fashion. His torso was covered with dome-like plates, the design not unlike that of the onion knights, with a strange eye-like emblem on the front. Finally he bared nothing on his arms nor had he anything for his legs, wearing only a loincloth.

'_Rather strange apparel,' _I thought to myself as I rocketed forward, Chloranthy Ring pumping extra energy into my legs.

I planted my left into the ground, twisting my body as I let the spear in my right fly directly to his head.

His left hand flicked out and severed the spear in two. I traced his hand and saw him wielding an Uchigatana. My eyes flickered to his other hand. Nothing, at least for the time being.

Pulling out my Demon's Great Axe, I charged forward. He responded by sending a fire bomb my way at high velocity. I step-sided it and continued my charge.

Raising the axe above my head, I smashed it into the ground, sending shock waves rippling from the ground. It catapulted my enemy into the sky, and I leapt up to deliver a downward strike. Holding out his right hand, it erupted into flames.

"Combustion."

The mini explosion repealed my attack, sending me back down to the earth. Rolling back, I instantly swapped to my bow, pulling back the string and nocking an arrow in one fluid motion. I let it fly and it tore through the air with a scream.

He flipped backwards and let gravity take over, the arrow grazing so close as to create sparks. He hit the ground in a crouch and dashed to my position and slashed.

I knocked the blow away with an arrow and flipped back, dodging a second slash. I drew my sword as I did, the Dragon Slayer Bow taking its latch on my back. I parried another slash and lunged forward.

Sensing the danger, my opponent jumped back and opened his right hand, again alight with his flame.

"Great Fireball."

He threw the flame at me, and I raised my shield in defense. The fire hit and exploded, but it did little as it spread harmlessly on the surface of ancient steel.

Wordlessly we charged each other, the ground crushing under the intense pressure that sent us forwards.

I met his blade in a split second connection. Bouncing back, I ducked under a wild slash and stabbed.

Again he jumped away, but this time I managed to land a minor hit to his arm, a long scratch leading from the base of his hand to his elbow. It was small granted, but it was more than anything that we did to each other before.

Flipping away from me, he once again launched a fireball at me. I twisted under the flames and moved forwards. I got within three feet and slashed.

He knocked the blow aside, and elbowed me. Air escaped my artificial lungs and I was winded. Taking the chance he leapt at me and cut the air with his blade.

It was fast. Too fast.

With essentially nothing to give away the attack, I could only tilt back to avoid the hit. I couldn't get enough space between myself and the blade, so I did something that rarely happened.

***SHINK***

My shield and hand fell uselessly to the ground. I growled in annoyance. That was going to make the fight a little more harder.

Apparently using all his stamina in that one attack, he could only dodge as I swung my sword in a barrage of deadly waves. Each one forcing him back further and further. It wore him down, each wild roll and flip taking more of his energy.

In an attempt to save energy, he began to parry the attacks that he could. One here, a couple there. It continued on until I decided to stop it.

Pulling my strength, I swung my sword like an axe and overpowered his guard, sending him flying. Instead of chasing after him, I jumped back and grabbed my fallen hand.

Holding it to the stump of my left arm, I could feel the resting flames rouse from their slumber, and they were already busy with fixing my hand. In moments the unattached limb was healed, as though they were never cut in the first place.

Using my now awakened fire, I lit my weapon in the chaotic light, and it blazed just like a pyre. Ahead, my enemy regained his footing and stood as though in an impasse.

We stood ten yards apart, a distance that could easily be made. It was a stand-off, each one of us waiting for the other to make a move.

I jumped up and twisted, dodging a creature that happened to get behind me. I snarled in frustration, it was going to be harder to fight him when there were more than one enemy.

The horned tiger's claws raked through the air, keeping pace as I bobbed and weaved. Moving back, the tiger lunged. Ducking down, the creature flew over my body. I threw my sword up into the air, and cleaved straight through the beast's belly.

Blood sprayed onto me as the once alive being hit the ground with a squish. It was a rather gruesome sight, but the details I could not determine as I was again forced into a fight.

I was sent back flying as the dark spirit's sword clashed against mine. Off balance, I was forced to go on the defensive as he continued to hack and slash at me.

My back pressed into a tree. Seeing a chance, he lunged forward with wild abandon. Pushing down with my feet, I prepared to jump up. However, I felt something stop me.

Turning around, I got to see what had stopped me from escaping: A god damn tree branch.

"You've got to be ki-"

Pain erupted in my chest as the sword was plunged right below my ribs. Sick red liquid flew from the wound and coated the blade. My enemy twisted the blade, only increasing the pain as it ground my insides.

He pulled out the blade and I fell to the ground on my knees. He lifted the blade up to deliver the final blow...

Only to stop.

Not because he hesitated, not because of something stopping his arm from swinging, but because of me. Specifically, my sword. He even looked surprised, as if he didn't expect me to shrug it off like it was nothing.

It planted deeply into his chest and ripped his heart into pieces. Fires burning brightly, the blade cauterized the wound from the inside, stopping any of his innate undead healing to take place. Faux blood spewed from the dark spirit's body and onto my face. It was a warm liquid, but I ignored it as I pulled out the blade.

Punching up, I sent my opponent back and rushed. Still stunned by the wound, I sent two vertical slashes and severed his arms cleanly off.

And with a hard grip I cut downward and his body split in two.

I swung the weapon, cleaning it of the blood. I calmly watched as his torn body disintegrated into red dust and was swept away by the wind.

I felt my chest. The giant gaping wound was still there, artificial blood seeping from the wound. Checking myself over, I couldn't help but get the feeling of disappointment. Most of the time battle with the dark spirits were long and hard, however this one was short lived.

His attacks could match me in strength, and he was just as fast as I was. He even took me by surprise with the attack that took my hand. However I was used to fighting beings far stronger and faster than myself. When faced with something of my own size and strength it just couldn't compare.

Thinking back, I realized that most battles had been like that to me. Once the mindless undead could slay me without a problem, but near the end of my journey in Lordran there was little that could give me a problem, not even the black knights with their ungodly strength could stop me.

I stood there, waiting for the words that would no doubt ring once again.

And it did.

_**Invader Banished**_

I shivered at the sound of the voice. It was strange, as it was a voice that I'd heard several times before but it was always like the first time to me.

I looked around. The area that once was a forest was... not so much of a forest anymore. The area had gotten much more damaged than I first thought, as craters lined the place and fires were burning all around.

I let out a sigh. I grabbed my axe up from the ground. Looking it over, it wasn't too damaged and would only need a couple minutes of repairing to fix. Unsurprising, seeing as it was made out of the bones of other demons. Their bodies were birthed from a twisted flame of 'life' that had no right to exist, and were extremely hardy because of that.

It was just a good weapon.

My shield on the other hand would need a little more fixing than first anticipated. While Artorias' Shield was made out of special metal and protected the user from fire, it was still rather beat up force caused by the impact of the ball of fire.

I went up to the body of one of the Earth Dragons. Grabbing it's head, I began to drag it to an area where I could bring it back.

A thought flashed through my mind, and I felt sweat go down my face.

There were more than just these creatures that I 'earned' in the forest.

* * *

"Holy crap!"

The voice belonging to a certain brown haired young man rang out in front of me. I twitched in mild annoyance at the volume of the voice.

"Those are a lot of... bodies."

I continued to drag the long train of the different Danger Beast corpses. Even on the way back to the base, the size of it increased as I was forced to protect it from the various other predators that saw a chance for food.

It took longer than expected to get back because of that, and by the time that I did, the sun was at it's peak. Which meant I missed breakfast, and probably lunch too.

Not that it really mattered, but food tasted good, and after spending so long without it... Well you try not to eat for more than one hundred years. Without dying. It's kinda hard to do.

Once I got near the back field of the base, I let down the rope that I used to pulled them in and began to coil it back up. The rope had helped me many times before, and I always kept on my person. It was fairly worn, but it was made out of the branches of few remaining arch-trees and it would not break anytime soon.

Tatsumi was out there training, seeing as he was shirtless, sweating and holding a heavy-looking sword. Akame was nearby, slowly eating out a slice of watermelon, watching over said training.

It didn't hold her attention though, and she approached me.

When she got five feet away from me, she lifted her hand and pointed. I looked behind myself at the area she specified. It was a bird. I turned back to face her. I stepped to the side and nodded at her.

Her eyes shined for a moment and she walked to the pile. Reaching out with a hand, she grabbed the claw of the Evil Bird and began to drag it off in a random direction. I could feel Tatsumi's eyes switching between me and her. Eventually he just let out a sigh and went back to his swinging of the sword.

I went up to a tree stump at the edge of the area. Taking a seat, I took out my repair box.

The box was completely mundane, or at least looked that way. It was made out of worn ebony wood, scratches lining both the outside and the inside. It was smaller than most others of it's kind, as when I first got it I believed that it wouldn't fit in my bottomless box.

Oh how wrong I was... If only I knew sooner...

Getting back on track, I flipped the cover open. Inside the box several instruments. There was a polishing cloth, a cleaning cloth, two files, a collection of whetstones and a small vial of oil, which for some reason never ran out. The biggest and most important one, however, was the mortar.

I reached down and picked up a random mundane rock. Using my somewhat choppy memory from Seath's Archives, I determined that it was an igneous rock. Had it been a sedimentary rock I would've thrown it away and picked up another one.

There was a reason for that. The different types of collective stones would make it harder to crush. I placed the rock in the mortar and held the pestle over it. Pressing it down with constant force, the rock slowly crumbled into the minerals that it was composed of. Reaching to my chest, I extracted a total of fifty souls from wherever they came from.

I crunched them. The souls quickly became a soft powdery mix, and I drizzled the powdered bits onto the dusted minerals. It flowed from my hand like little sparkly waterfall, and coated the dust. Pulling out the pestle once again, I pressed the souls together with the dust.

A bright light began to emit from the mixture, but I ignored it in favor of continuing to grind the two together. I could feel little pops underneath my hand as the dust slowly became something more useful.

Repair Powder.

Through some kind of enchantment, or perhaps that power of souls, the crushed rocks were given the ability to reform and restore any weapon or object, so long as it was dead—as in fully, 100% dead—or not living in the first place. Any cracks, filled in seconds. Any pieces chipped off, replaced without flaw. Any burns, frost, or poisons, dissipated instantly.

It was a very strange half-miracle. It came from the power of the soul, something that was not fully understood by even Logan, before he went insane. The powder was incredibly fragile because of it's nature though, so it had to be used or else the rest of it would disappear.

It wouldn't work on things made out of crystals though, as crystals have been attributed with immortality, and as such breaking it wouldn't count as damage. It's rather hard to explain, and trying to fully understand it might drive me insane, so I'll leave it at that.

Gently I lifted up some of the powder. Pulling out my sword, I began to coat the blade with the repair powder. The golden dust lit up as it did, and began to work it's magic.

The sword's burns from the battle slowly faded away. The little cuts and scratches filled. The wearing of the handle and pommel disappeared, going back to the state they were when it was just made. All within the span of five seconds.

I put down the repair box and picked up the sword. Still glowing from the repair, I walked up to an open area with nothing in the way. Feeling the blade's weight, I judged that it was fully repaired.

Then I began to train on my giant slaying hits.

Holding the weapon lightly in my right hand, I pointed it at an invisible opponent. Remembering the common fighting method of a giant, I moved forward.

_**Stab. **_Air rushed aside from my blade, the force and speed forcing them out.

I back-stepped and ducked beneath an invisible halberd swing. Throwing my weight forward into a roll, I kicked out with my feet at where the giant's right knee would be. The giant would be brought to his knees. Dodging a hand, I cut it with a well timed slash.

Throwing myself away from a shield smash, I charged right at the giant, still unbalanced. Digging my feet into the ground, I jumped and delivered an uppercut, splitting the giant's helm. Still in the air, I could feel the spirit of Sif growl in my mind. I smirked and whipped the sword in front of me, somersaulting forward.

The air screamed as I rocketed forward, severing my invisible opponent in half. I hit the ground heavy, cracks weaving from underneath where I landed.

_One._

Using my sword as leverage, I dodged my next opponent's wild smash. Pulling another memory from my mind, the spirit of Smough appeared in front of me, in all of his pseudo fat glory. He rocked forward with speed not fit for something that large. Lifting his ridiculous hammer into the air, the invisible giant slammed it into the area I occupied.

I rolled to the right, just barely managing to avoid getting 'smashed', and charged forward. I cut into his side, and he lurched over. Jumping up, I kicked his head down towards the ground. His helm hit the ground with an artificial thud. In a surprisingly ironic scene, I lifted my blade up and severed where his heck would have been.

_Two._

Huh. I actually remembered him being tougher than that...

Oh.

I 'felt' a spear pierce through my chest. I stood there as I imagined what would happen. I would've been lifted up by Orenstein's spear, and thousands—if not millions—of volts of electricity would run through my body, rendering it unmoving for a couple of seconds, after which Orestein would toss me to places unknown.

I swiped my sword through the air in one final test swing. It was strong enough to not be damaged by even hitting the uneven ground.

I replaced it back on my hip. I looked back to repair my axe next, only to find two pairs of eyes staring at me.

Najenda, who's only give away the slightly open mouthed look and slightly widened eyes, and Tatsumi, who flat out looked like the world had just exploded, in a good way.

Najenda recovered first.

"You're... stronger than I thought," she said, an awkward smile on her face. "When Bulat told me, I didn't quite expect something like this."

"Don't your expectations," I said in reply. "In a real fight anything can happen, so I doubt I would be able to take anyone out with those alone."

"WOW!" Tatsumi burst in, a wild grin smacked right in his face. "That was awesome! Hey Mark, can you teach me how to do that?"

I lifted an eyebrow at him. "What could you possibly need me to teach you? Often times the best way to learn is through self teaching."

"But that flip!" He exclaimed loudly. "That was awesome! Besides, you even said you would before my mission. Come on, Mark!"

"Oh." I forgot about that while I fought the dark spirit. "Alright. First you need to be able to use this. With one hand. " My hand flipped the opening to the bottomless box and I reached in.

I pulled out a Stone Greatsword with ease. The abnormally large weapon could somehow fit in the box, and came out with the same ease of lifting it. Wielded by the Stone Knights who guarded the Darkroot Garden, it was imbued with the same magic that made the Knights.

I twirled it around a couple times before planting it in the ground. "Here. Try to pick it up."

Tatsumi walked up and grasped the hilt. While he did so, Najenda walked up to me. "What is that?" She pointed at my bottomless box.

I untied it from my belt and handed it over, knowing that there was no way to avoid it. I handed it over without complaint.

"I honestly have no idea how it works," I said, scratching my head. "All I know is that it can hold literally anything, so long as you can lift it."

Those were the actual rules. If I wanted, I could lift up a person and shove them in there, but the last time I did the person was very angry. Apparently it was very boring in there.

"I guess I've seen stranger. Where did you get it and what is it called?" Najenda looked into the bottomless box, and reached her hand into it. She pulled out my ring of keys.

"It's called a bottomless box, and as for where I got it..." I paused for some effect, "A random street vendor who's probably dead by now."

She raised an eyebrow at me. "What do you mean by that?"

"He was completely insane by anyone's standard," I replied. "He may have even died that very day I meet him."

"Ah," was all she said as she refocused her attention to the box. I heard a loud grunt behind me, and I turned.

Tatsumi was struggling underneath the weight of the Stone Greatsword, barely able to lift the heavy stone slab onto his shoulder. The fact he could even lift it was a great show of strength. Already, he was getting much more stronger than when I first saw him in front of the warehouse.

"What is this made of, solid rock?" He asked, sweat beading down his face as he frowned.

"Yes it is," was my eloquent response.

He almost dropped the sword. "What!?"

"Oh yeah," I said, taking the sword off his shoulder and he collapsed to the ground. "If you ever end up in trouble, lift it above your head and a miracle will occur."

"How will I be able to lift THAT above my head?" He asked incredulously.

"Practice," I said to him. "After all, there isn't any other way that I could've been gotten stronger myself."

A lie, but an easy one.

"Ugh..." He groaned. He stood up again, this time a determined look on his face. "Alright, let me at it!"

I handed him the weapon, which dropped a couple centimeters before he managed to put it above his shoulder again.

"Okay, first try a swi-"

_**Crash**_

I turned back to Najenda. She was standing over an assortment of different bladed and not-so-bladed weapons. In her hand was an upside-down bottomless box.

I pressed my hand against my face. "Let me take care of this first."


	8. Creating New Bonds

_Dark Souls and Akame ga Kill belong to their respective owners. I own nothing._

* * *

_**Hey! It looks like I haven't updated this in a LONG time (about a month if I'm not mistaken), so I'm going to try to pump this out a little faster than usual. While doing so I also managed to get past the 100 favs and follows line, which is a big surprise to me. So thank you all for reading my story and enjoying it enough to follow it. **_

_**One thing that I've noticed about this story is that there might be some... inconsistencies. I was going to fix them, but when I tried I discovered that I could no longer edit the old chapters... so I may end up writing as if I never did... so yeah. This one consists of a character entering the spotlight, and will stay there for a little while; at least two more chapters. The next chapter is already in the woodworks, and I'm working really hard to make it my longest and highest quality chapter, perhaps for my entire "career" of fanfic writing.**_

_**Who knows? Maybe the great Gabe-sama will acknowledge my existence :P**_

_**As for responses, I don't really need to do them this time because most of them are answered, I PM'd them or they were merely comments and not questions, so yeah.**_

_**Anyway, rather short chapter with a spotlight on one specific character, CU and the goddamn water (which do not mix, at all), and Mine being pissy as usual.**_

_**So, this has been **_**Joe, _signing out!_**

* * *

I ran through the forest, trees whipping by my face at high velocity. I could feel the ground lowering, and I slowed down. Eventually, the small trees let up their branches, and I found myself at the edge of a cliff.

I lifted up my bow and planted it into the ground. Pulling out one of the dragon slaying arrows, I drew back my bow and notched it. Idly I noted that I only had about seven hundred of them left.

I refocused at the forest beneath me. Looking for any movement at all. I could feel the effects of the Hawk Ring sharpen my vision, and even in the trees I could see the patterns on the leaves. Wind blew through the forest, and I closed my left eye to avoid it from blurring.

I couldn't get over how clean this place was. No matter how many times I breathed in this air, I no longer felt like I was contained within that ashen dome. In fact, it no longer felt like I was contained within the land of Lordran, that I was free of the reach of the fate of the und-

_**There.**_

My eyes flickered to my target instantly, and my position twisted. I let out a breath on instinct and my mind cleared. There was nothing in the void within my mind, nothing except for my target. He was dressed in desert white garbs, and wore no shirt, giving his position away clearly in the forest.

I pulled the string all the way to a full draw. And with a smooth movement I let my arrow fly.

The arrow screamed through the air as it headed to it's target at mach speed. My target could only look up before the arrow skewered him, ripping his upper body from his lower one.

My focus began to fade when another target appeared, and I targeted him. This one was dressed just the same, and was following a dirt road.

…

Why is there a dirt road leading directly into the Night Raid base?

…

While I was contemplating the sheer stupidity of that subject, I heard the sound of tearing flesh nearby. I looked to my left, and found both Sheele and Mine together a couple of meters away, standing right in the open.

Both of them were covered in blood, so I guessed that they had already killed one.

Mine stood up.

"That was a nice pinch! That risk was enough to reach him!"

She leveled her Teigu, Pumpkin, at the enemy, and pulled the trigger. A red hot flare erupted from the barrel, and a laser shot out. The roar behind it shook the forest, and her target tried to avoid it, only to be baked into ash.

"Nice shot!" I yelled, giving her a thumbs up.

"Hmph, as if I would miss a shot like that," she replied with a cocky tone, crossing her arms and looking away.

"Sure, sure. In return, here's something to look at!" I pulled back the bowstring and nocked another arrow. I aimed the bow straight at her.

She opened her eyes. "Hey, what do you think you're doing with that th-"

I let the arrow fly. Instinctively she ducked, and the arrow sped harmlessly above her head.

"HEY! What the hell wa-" she screamed at me, but the sound of metal meeting flesh sounded from behind her. She turned around.

Pinned the tree behind her was one of the intruders. Blood soaked the area as the arrow went through his neck, piercing one of his main veins. His body spasmed as his life left him, leaving a warm but clearly dead human.

It was surprisingly brutal even for me.

I slacked my bowstring. A clean shot. Quickly, I checked around my position. Not a trace.

"Hell yeah!" I whooped, swinging my fist above my head.

"Shut up!" Mine yelled at me. "Sheele could've gotten him fine!"

"Thank you, Mark," Sheele spoke up as she bowed in my direction. "I didn't notice him until you shot him."

"No problem," I replied, scratching the back of head. "It wasn't much, I'm sure that even if I didn't make the shot Mine would be fine."

"Sheele..." Mine said, a sweat drop running down his face. "You're not helping me..."

Sheele tilted her head, a look of confusion marking her face. "How am I not helping you? I'm thanking Mark in your stead, isn't that considered helpful?"

"No it's not helping..." Mine held her face in one hand, her anger dissipating as she looked at her friend. "Let's just drop this subject.

"And you!" She turned and pointed at me. "Just this once I'll let you go. Hmph!"

With that she turned around and began to walk off in a random direction, crossing her arms in disdain. After looking at her direction, I noticed a rather large rock in the path of her foot.

"Uh Mine," I said, trying to catch her attention. "You might want to watch where you're s-"

But it was too late.

Almost in slow motion, the pinkette took another step forwards. Her hair colored shoe moved downwards. The tip of the shoe planted the slanted rock surface. Shifting her weight forwards, the unattached rock decided that moving back was a smart idea. Rolling against her momentum, the change was enough for the friction holding her onto the rock to give way for her weight.

In a stunt of grace that even Solaire would've been impressed by, her body moved in a perfect arc. Her eyes snapped open by the sudden acceleration, and her arms uncrossed in an attempt to stop herself. It wasn't fast enough.

It was glorious. It was magical. It was something out of comed-

_**Thud.**_

Her forehead met the floor with bluntness directly opposing the grace she showed just moments before.

"10/10 for grace and elegance, would b—erm, I mean are you alright?" I began instinctively before cutting myself off. Dammit, Chuckles! You and your insanity is reaching me even now!

Slowly, Mine pushed herself off the ground with both arms. There was no show of pain in her movements, and I was very mildly impressed that she could ignore a fall like that. And there she stood, her back facing towards me.

Eventually, her shoulders began to shake.

"Mine?" I asked, hesitatingly taking a step forward.

"Mark..." She said, not moving from her position, shoulders still trembling. I could feel the once fresh air being filled with something familiar. Very familiar.

"Uh... Yes, Mine?" I said, taking a step backwards, feeling immense pressure being exerted on my very soul.

There was a moment of silence. Perhaps it was for my to-be-buried body of the future.

And she turned around, arms being pressed together, to face me.

Her forehead had a reddish mark, obviously from hitting the floor. The front of her hair was unkempt, and covered in trace amounts of dirt. Finally her eyes were fine, in their undamaged pink.

The problem was the little teardrops that were in the corner of her eyes.

They... reminded me too much of my Mistress. They dug deep into my psyche, and I was stuck between three decisions: go comfort her like I would for my Lady, runaway from the ever increasing blood lust, or stand there like an idiot.

I took the third choice.

"You planned that didn't you?!" She screamed at me. I stood there dumbly at her outburst.

"Ah, so we're playing that game, are we?" She said when I didn't reply. She turned around and bent forward, picking up the very rock that she tripped on. She faced me.

Gone was the tears. Instead, her eyes held the promise of death, brimming with anger that wouldn't be out of place in Lordran. The killing intent soaked the air, drenching me and me alone.

I took a couple steps backwards.

"Now, now," I said, trying to calm her down. "If you think about it, there's no possible way that I could have planned that-"

"Shut up! I can play at that game too!" She interrupted my attempt, and reeled back.

Knowing from experience that it was a throw, I rocked myself to the side, folding into a roll. As I did, Mine took a step forward and traced her hand through the air, letting the rock go flying.

The projectile rocketed past me as I rolled back up.

_**HHURK**_

I looked at the area that I had been. Standing there was a tree. _Was. _In it's place was a stump, with a very clear circle of entry that defined the hit area.

Instantly I began to run, hearing the sound of Mine's Pumpkin revving up. I twitched and ran through the forest, rolling and sidestepping whenever I could feel the air twisting it's way around the plasma-like bullets.

"Get back here, bastard!" I could hear Mine yelling from behind me, bullets still flying in my direction.

"Sheele! Help me!" I cried out.

"Sorry Mark," she said somewhere of to my left. "I haven't seen Mine this mad in a long time, so I don't know how to calm her down."

"Are you kidding me!?" I said, now running at full sprint through the forest, the mini explosions booming behind me, tearing through the trees and other forest beings.

"Would the quote 'Hell hath no fury like woman scorned' be of help?"

"Hell no!"

* * *

"You alright now, Mine?" I nudged the pink lump on my shoulder.

I got a groan in reply. "I don't think that I'll be able to walk for at least twenty minutes. Carry me all the way back to the meeting place, moron," she grumbled, clear signs of tiredness in her voice. The only thing that was keeping her awake the fact that I was there.

"'Kay, got it." I shifted my hold on the pinkette, putting her in a more comfortable position.

Mine was too drowsy to notice, head nodding in an unknown rhythm. "You better repay me for my kindness, newbie. I could've killed you if I wanted."

"I will." My eyebrows twitched. Indeed I would. After being pelted in the back of the head with extremely hot projectiles, there was no way that I wouldn't. I would pay her with something that wasn't money.

"Good," she said, eyelids twitching shut.

We walked in silence for some time. Eventually, Mine's breathing evened, signifying her departure into the dream world.

With her lips slightly parted and little breaths coming to and from her mouth, she looked like a sleeping house cat. Cute, but if disturbed it would try to kill you.

A quiet giggle came from my left. I turned and cocked an eyebrow.

"What's so funny?" I asked.

"You just look like some kind of prince," Sheele replied.

"I do?" I checked myself over. Well, if you took into account my elite knight set and the fact I was holding Mine like a princess, it did seem to look that way.

"I guess I do," I shrugged. "Though it is a little embarrassing."

She let out another giggle. I rotated my head to face her.

Sheele had a height slightly above average, and had a slender build to match it. Her hair was a long purple, reaching half way down her back. She wore a rather revealing cheongsam and detached arm sleeves of the shade of lilac. Sheele also wore long white boots that lead only partway up her thigh, revealing a bit too much skin for most people to be truly comfortable with. Finally, she wore a pair of glasses that rest in front of a pair of purple eyes.

Sheele could really be described in one word: Purple.

Even her weapon of choice fit that word, the handle of the giant pair of scissors colored a shade of magenta. The only parts not purple were the blade itself and the cute little panda decoration.

Ah yes, her weapon. As stated it was an oversized pair of scissors, standing just short of her shoulders. Though from the markings on the handle I could guess she used it like a sword.

I actually had no idea how the weapon worked. Swinging around a pair of scissors like a sword? In your dreams. The most you could do was stabbing damage, and Sheele's weapon looked like a little kids scissor.

So I decided to ask her about it.

"Hey, Sheele," I said, pulling her out of her little fit.

"Hmm?" She let out, inquiring.

"How do you use that thing?" I motioned at the scissors with my head, my hands at the time filled.

"Oh. This?" She lifted up her scissors. "It is called Extase. It is a very large pair of scissors. It is also my teigu."

"Your teigu? What can it do?" I asked, intrigued. Who wouldn't want to know about a giant pair of scissors being used as a weapon?

"Well, it cut anything into two," she said casually.

I almost tripped. "What?"

"It can cut anything," Sheele repeated.

"I know, I got that," I said, "but what do you mean by that? It couldn't possibly cut _anything_."

"Well," Sheele lifted up Extase, and slashed out with the scissors...

Which ended up cutting cleanly through all the nearby trees, and thankfully not me. I gaped at the demonstration. I began to change my opinion of teigus before stopping myself. I could easily do the same with a weapon of my own.

"... It can do that." Sheele began to tuck her weapon back underneath her arm.

"Wait," I stopped her. Carefully, I leaned Mine against one of the mossy stumps. Then I reached into my Bottomless Box. Reaching deep into the depths of strange box, my hand found its way around smooth bone. Tightening my grip around the weapon, I pulled out the immortal weapon from the box.

The Dragon Tooth. It was the legendary weapon of Havel the Rock, which he used after ripping it out of a dragon's mouth. And then proceeded to beat the dragon to death with it. Looking at the size of the thing, the beast must have been massive. Rather impressive if you ask me.

Getting back on track, the weapon had a reputation of being unbreakable, being made out of one of the toughest bone in a dragon. Which was the reason that I was going to test the scissors with it. I never used the weapon anyway, and I didn't have the respect for old history like I should. Logan would've killed me.

Regardless, I hefted the Dragon Tooth up and slammed it into the ground, causing a minor shock wave to shake the ground. I looked over to see if that woke up Mine, but thankfully it didn't.

I turned back to Sheele.

"Try cutting into this," I told her.

Immediately, she swung out with her scissor aimed directly at the dragon's tooth.

…

Saying that I wasn't surprised was an absolute lie. The fact that a woman with sticks as arms could swing a large weapon that fast was something that I was already far too used to, but it was the effect that happened after she swung that surprised me.

Extase dug an inch into the Dragon Tooth.

"Huh?" Sheele's face shaped in confusion. "It should have cut all the way through."

"Wow," I said, cupping my chin, "this kind of damage I've never seen on the Dragon Tooth."

I traced the scratch with my hand after Sheele pulled out her scissors. It was a clean and clear cut, no illusions or mind tricks.

I stood back up. "Impressive. Your weapon must have saved your life more than just a couple of times."

"Ah. It has," was her reply, though she was staring quite hard at the Dragon Tooth, as though the feat was impossible. Maybe it was, I wouldn't know.

I pulled the Tooth back into Box, and picked up the still unconscious Mine, who surprisingly didn't wake up during that little test.

"Come on," I ushered her, "I don't think the others will have the patience for any more of this."

* * *

My lungs... were bursting.

The lack of oxygen was excruciating. It burned me more than fire ever did, even the flame of the Kiln could not reach the level of agony that I experienced.

I opened my mouth in a wordless cry of terror, but no one answered. I was alone in this cold, dark world.

I was going to die.

Reaching out my hand for the last time, something shined out of the corner before my consciousness could fade.

In a last ditch attempt, I sent my hand out to it. And grabbed it.

I pulled myself out of the water, coughing and hacking the dangerous level of water that somehow managed to get in my lungs. I could feel the flames inside me evaporating the water that I couldn't vomit, and it began to invisibly fix my body.

I crawled a couple feet from the shore of the rapids before collapsing, breathing all the air that my lungs could handle before erupting into another wave of coughing.

"Are you alright?"

I looked up. "I will be... In a little bit..." I managed to get out before coughing again. "I hate water..."

"If you told me that I probably would've run you through a different part of the assassin-training curriculum."

"Was there much of a point in running me through this? I'm pretty sure we would've gotten more done if I had helped out with something you normally do."

My current 'teacher' was Sheele, who was calmly seated on a rock by the side of the river. She decided to go and run me through her regular training regimen, which involved my most hated activity: swimming. Before I could protest Sheele pushed me into the river and I had to fight for my life to survive.

Sheele adjusted her glasses. "Actually, I don't have anything that I have to do."

I pushed myself up and turned to face her. "What do you mean?" I asked.

She lifted up a hand, as though preparing to tell a tale. "Well, you see..." she began. "Whenever I try to cook, I end up burning all the food that I put on the heater, and I was finally kicked out when I accidentally burnt fresh meat that Akame had just brought in.

"So then I tried my hand at cleaning, so I tried to help Bulat. But when I did, I ended up tripping over one of the buckets of water, and spilled water all over. I ended up making a mess that was bigger than the one that I was trying to clean up, and so Bulat had to take over.

"So then Leone suggested that I go shopping for the stuff that we needed, as at the time my face wasn't on any of the wanted posters. However, when I did, I mistook sugar for salt, and ended up buying tons of sugar that we didn't even need. Leone ended up laughing at me for more than thirty minutes before Najenda stepped in. Then I ended up getting seen during a mission and my face has been on a wanted poster since.

"Finally, when I tried to do laundry, Mine went with me just in case something happened. I was doing fine until I zoned out and ended up washing Mine along with all the clothes."

"Pff..." I held my mouth in an attempt to hold in my laughter, but I couldn't. "Hahahahaha! You put Mine along with the laundry? HAHAHAHA!"

Sheele had enough tact to look away, slightly blushing. I managed to pull my laughter in enough to think and talk clearly.

"Sorry, sorry... That was a little rude." I apologized. "Though with all of that, how did you end up as an assassin? I can't see how a cute, clumsy girl like you would become an assassin."

"It's a long story..." The air around her got just heavy enough for me to notice. I walked up and sat next to her.

"Is it something you want to share?" I asked somewhat hesitantly. I didn't like delving into other people's pasts. It felt like it was intruding, but for some people sharing was a way to get something off your chest.

"I haven't told very many people this story, but I feel like I can trust you with it," Sheele replied to me, giving me a small smile.

A jolt went through my chest. Trust. It was a word that I was unused to. In Lordran, anything and everything was out to kill you. Trust was hard to find there. And even to find trust, you first had to rely on yourself to trust another, because giving that trust to the wrong person was as deadly as poison. In short, it was hard to trust, and even harder to receive it.

Sure, there were exceptions like Solaire. But he was misplaced, a hero that belonged in an epic, not a rotting kingdom filled with depths of emotion that came from both the greatest saint and most damned sinner.

To be trusted so easily by someone that I barely knew, someone who I barely interacted with, was warming. And it was familiar.

I gave Sheele a small smile. "Then please do, continue on."

"Then let's begin..."

"I grew up in the lower district of the capital. I lived with my clumsiness all my life, and it didn't make my childhood any easier. No matter what I did, there would always be something that I would trip over.

"Because of that, there was nothing that I could be proud of. I couldn't keep up shop like the rest of the other girls in the area, nor could I serve others with any amount of skill. I was mocked for it. 'That girl has a screw loose in her head', people would call me. 'Worthless garbage'. 'Spaz'. All of them just a few of the insults that I was called all my life.

"However, there was someone who wanted to be friends with me, even though she knew about me from the others. She would bring me into her house and we would talk. No matter how clumsy I was, she would never call me stupid or insult me.

"The time that I spent with her was the only thing that I could say that I liked about my life. Until that day.

"While I was visiting her, an angry man arrived at her door. It was her ex-boyfriend. He resented being dumped by her. At first we tried to calm him down, but his anger clouded his thoughts, and he became violent. He beat us. He knocked me down to the ground, and then...

"Right in front of me, he grabbed her throat and began choking her.

"By the way his eyes were blood-shot and spittle came from his mouth, it was clear that he was high on drugs. But I didn't notice. At the time I could only think one thing: 'I must save her'. So I took a knife from the kitchen and slashed at his throat. He wasn't on guard, so it was an easy hit.

"I was surprisingly calm though. Even when my friend couldn't stop shaking by staring at the body, my mind was clear.

"Eventually, the incident was ruled as an act of self defense. However, my friend never wanted to see me again. I don't blame her though; she gave me enough friendship to fill my lifetime, and I did something unforgivable.

"Not long after... When I was walking through the city after getting food, a group of men suddenly surrounded me. They wanted revenge for the man that I had killed. My friend's ex-boyfriend turned out to be the second-in-command of a local gang.

"'We've already killed your parents, and now it's your turn' is what they said to me. While they were saying this to me, surprising as it was, my mind was once again clear.

"The first man's hit was clumsy, completely untrained on any standard. So I dodged. While he was over-extended, I lashed out, and struck underneath his ribs, piercing his heart and killing him instantly. Then, using him as a shield, I proceeded to kill the other men one by one. And when I finally killed all of them, I finally understood.

"There was actually a screw loose in my head, and it made me a very talented killer.

"'I could get rid of society's trash'. 'This was the one thing that I could do so that I wouldn't be considered useless' is what I thought."

"Not long after that, I ended up getting scouted by the Revolutionary Army to carry out assassinations in the capital." Sheele ended her story somewhat abruptly.

I leaned backwards, and rested my head on my hands.

"You know, your story reminds me of one that I know." I said after a moment of thought.

"Really?" Sheele blinked in surprise.

"Yeah," I said. "As thanks for telling me your story I'll tell you this one."

I opened my mouth to tell my tale.


	9. Looking Back At Old Ones

_Dark Souls and Akame ga Kill belong to their respective owners. I own nothing._

* * *

_**AN : FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU-**_

_**Well, I'm honestly surprised that not a single flame has appeared on this story (unless you consider the ones where people are screaming at me to finish this chapter lol) when it's titled 'The Flame King'. Well, whatever. Not going to do feedback or anything this time, because that would end up stopping you from reading.**_

_**If I don't publish another chapter in a month, flame the hell out of me. I deserve it.**_

* * *

I pulled back on the bow, feeling the familiar weight tug back at me. The Dragon Slaying Bow was quickly becoming my most used weapon, and I could never bored by the tension. Looking down at the box that hung from my waist, I realized that I was neglecting some of my other skills in return. Putting my bow down, I moved my hand behind my head and gave it a brief scratching, feeling a little peeved at myself.

"I guess it's just that I haven't had that much of a reason to use anything aside from my bow in a long while," I told myself quietly. What I said was true, though. The only other person in Night Raid with a ranged weapon was Mine, leaving me to take half her workload as a result.

Which was quite a bit, actually. Considering her lazy attitude, I would have expected that she would've had the smallest amount of work out of the entire group. However, because she could take out enemies from a long range without even being found, she was requested often; though not to the extent of Akame and Bulat.

So the laziness ended up effecting me, of course. I ended up going on a lot of the missions that Mine was requested to do, just because she had seniority over me. At the very least I got to get my name out as another of the group, for better or for worse.

However, Mine's laser cannon still had the advantage at long ranges as the speed would never drop versus my arrows which did. There was also gravity that pulled down on both of them, but the beam of light was far less affected by it. My arrows had a more consistent damage range, while Mine's was powered by how much crap she was in, so that was an advantage. My bows were also quieter, leading to more stealth.

All of that lead to my position during team missions: Alternate Long-Range Support. ALRS for short. I was placed in-between the Main group (at the time: Akame, Bulat, Leone, Lubbock and Sheele) and the Far group (Mine and Tatsumi), the latter of which would be the ones to take out our target during this mission.

It was set up this way because our target happened to live in a HUGE eastern mansion off to the side of a town. Going into the place and slitting out his throat was a little hard considering that he had several martial artists as guards, all of which were also among our sub-targets. Going in would simply cause too much chaos in such close quarters, along with the large amount of innocents that were involved.

So we came up with a plan. And I've got to admit, it was kinda risky.

I let out a sigh, calming my mind from all the weird thoughts running through it. With casual ease, I slipped the Child's mask over my face, relishing in the energy that filled my body. It sharpened my vision through the narrow slits of the mask, almost making up for the lack of peripheral vision.

I knelt down and picked up my bow once again. It was almost time. Instead of reaching into my Bottomless Box for my normal arrows, I grabbed the metallic device stabbed into the ground next to me.

It was a little something that Lubbock had thought up one day when he took a look at my bow. Abusing my Bow's ridiculous draw weight, he devised to use it as a something to deliver quick signals. It was essentially a long pole with a stick of dynamite stuck to the end of it. The dynamite had a special property though, as when it reached a certain height the explosive would go off.

I was unsure how, but they really worked. Once again Lubbock had surprised me with his hidden intelligence.

It was large, the same size as the my regular Dragon Slaying Arrows. It was strong as well, but it had to be so it wouldn't get ripped to pieces by the Bow's strength. A couple accidents had proved that. It also had the interesting choice on what color I wanted it to explode in, another thing that I couldn't understand. I guess it was like a prism stone in that way.

I notched into onto my Bow. Tilting my head up to the sky, the bow soon followed and the projectile with it. My eyes weren't though; they were instead focussing on the target's home.

My eyes narrowed even further as I felt a familiar buzz from my left hand. My vision sharpened three-fold what it had before hand, giving me crystal clear clarity that I was unused to.

As though I commanded it to, the grand front doors to the mansion slowly opened up, and a wave of servant girls came outside.

Soon following behind them was our target, a smug grin plastered onto his face clearly.

So I pulled back my bow and let it fly.

* * *

Several Hours Earlier

* * *

"We've received a new assignment." Najenda spoke to us in in a clear voice, all of Night Raid at the meeting table.

"Really?" Mine asked, her face mildly colder than it was usually. It was the face that she wore whenever we met like this, the thrill of the hunt was real alright. "Who's the hit?"

"The man's name is Iokal. He is a distant relative of the Prime Minister, so you can see why he's such a high priority target even before what he's done." Najenda produced a drawing of his mug.

Iokal look surprisingly similar to the Prime Minister, at least where his face was concerned. His hair was shorter though, and he sported a pair of small, round glasses. He looked to be wearing a military uniform with a fur collar, along with a long sash.

All in all, he looked like an utter jackass.

"Quite the ugly bastard, isn't he?" Leone muttered under her breath, just loud enough for me to hear. A dark shadow covered the upper half of her face, giving her the appearance of a reaper.

"I'll have to agree," Bulat muttered back, and I grunted, seconding their opinions quietly.

Whipping out a knife, Najenda stabbed his face with it, the blade digging into the table.

Off to the side, I held in a wince. I was probably the one that was going to fix it or replace it once the meeting was over.

"He uses the Minister's name to kidnap and rape women. After they've 'served their purpose', he would proceed to beat them to death." Najenda continued on darkly, my close slip going unnoticed (or ignored). "His five guards participate in this brutality as well, so they too are guilty."

"His guards," Bulat raised up a hand like he was a school student. "Are they noteworthy for anything?"

"They are," Najenda nodded in his direction. "All of them were disciples of the Way of the Imperial Fists, and good ones at that. At least two of them were ex-instructors."

"'Imperial Fists'?" I asked, confused. It was not something that I had run into inside Lubbock's book store, nor something I had heard of it from anyone. I turned over to Tatsumi for his reaction.

"Oh!" Tatsumi let out and planted his right fist in his other hand, like he recognized the term. To say I was surprised by that was an understatement: he had a habit of being completely clueless.

He probably saw my confusion, because he turned to me to explain. "You see, the Way of the Imperial Fists is renowned as the Empire's best school of martial arts. They all learn the very same techniques that the very first masters created hundreds of years ago. Most of the stuff that they teach was learned from the masters before them." Tatsumi smiled. "I had actually planned to take a look at it before I ended up here."

I was impressed by that, both at Tatsumi and the Imperial Fist's temple. If it had managed to survive throughout all of those years, then it must have quite the good training place. More impressive that it even reached the ears of Tatsumi, who was still considered a country boy by the others, and the fact that he remembered.

"Thanks, I guess," I said. I didn't really want to crush his happiness, so I made no extra comment. The others weren't as considerate.

"Imagine that, the country hick actually knows something for once," Mine mocked, though it wasn't quite as harsh as it was normally.

Not that it made much of a difference.

"What was that?!" Tatsumi's good mood crashed to the ground as he attempted to jump his insulter. At the last second Bulat reached out a hand and grabbed him by his collar, forcing him back into his spot.

"Remember…" Bulat spoke slowly to Tatsumi.

He just sulked in response. "I hate this system."

Leone let out a quick laugh. "Don't let it get to you. Soon you'll be able to go out as you like, like us." Leone cupped her hand underneath her chin. "Though, I'm surprised that you would know something like that. Where did you learn about it?"

"Oh, that's mostly because of my teacher," Tatsumi said, his head lifting up a little bit. "He said that he used to fight alongside some of their disciples. It was also a common story told to the children in the village, so that they could grow stronger."

"Wait, teacher?" "You had a teacher?"

Both Najenda and I asked the same question at the same time. Our eyes met, and came to a silent agreement. I opened my mouth first. "From your style of fighting, I just assumed that you taught yourself."

"Technically. My teacher told got me through the basics." Tatsumi elaborated. "Most of the time he just left out in the wilderness to fend for myself against the Danger Beasts."

The last comment was enough for everyone feel a little pity. In my opinion it was brutal, yeah, but it was effective. It was a method that I had used once before actually. If they managed to survive (on their own feet) they were almost always stronger than the rest.

However, I noticed that Najenda's eye had narrowed slightly, just for a moment. "Who was your teacher?" She questioned, face straightening into a blank slate.

Though she had a laid-back side to her, the action still proved that she really was the leader of a group of assassins. Her cover was almost as good as to fool even me. My respect towards her had increased.

"He was a retired soldier," Tatsumi said, brows furrowed. "What he was doing in our village, I don't really know. Maybe he like the wild?" He just shrugged.

Najenda shook her head. "That's not what I meant. What was your teacher's name?"

Tatsumi paused and cupped his chin, mimicking Leone's earlier action. He became deep in thought, something rare for him. After a while, he opened his mouth, only to clamp it back down.

"Well?" Sheele broke through the silence before it became too long to bear.

"Uh… How should I say this…?" Tatsumi scratched his head. "I don't… Remember?'"

…

The silence after was far more prolonged than that of the one before. And like a spark against tinder, we all broke out in laughter.

"Y-you don't -ha- even remember your -gasp- teacher's own name?" Lubbock managed to get out, his voice littered with laughter.

"What kind of idiot forgets their only teacher's name?" Mine was clutching her stomach as she rolled across the ground.

Even Najenda was chuckling from her chair at the head of the table, though she said no comment.

Me? Well, I just smiled at the absurdity of the situation. "A special kind of idiot, it seems."

Tatsumi gave me a betrayed look, and I felt just a little sorry for him. However, as he looked at me, his eyes widened slightly.

"Wow. Now that I think about it, you look a lot like my teacher," Tatsumi said, managing to ignore the laughter.

"Really?" I questioned, a smile still on my face. "I shouldn't have any relatives that live anywhere here."

"Oh," Leone laughed, nudging me with her elbow. "You wouldn't happen to forget a student of yours?"

"Of course not," I dismissed her claim. "I remember all of my students, regardless of who they were or what they were like."

"Oh, you've taught before?" Bulat asked.

"The think that using the word 'teaching' is a stretch," I said, thinking back on those cold winter days. "Though I definitely taught them the basics of using weapons, I more or less beat the lessons into them until they learned." Literally.

"That sounds more brutal than my teacher's" Tatsumi took a step back.

"Don't worry, I won't being doing that to anyone here," I promised him. I didn't deny the fact that it was brutal, because it was.

The training was harsh to an insane level; but then again the circumstances were insane as well so it worked. It fit with the students that I taught perfectly. For the meek but intelligent, I taught them to use their head in stressful times and to never hesitate when doing so. For the strong but cocky, it taught them to never underestimate their enemies and that there was always something better. For the hot-blooded but hard-working, it taught them to keep cool and assess the situation.

Elizabeth, Xavier and Robert. Those were the names of my "students", though later on the term "companion" was more accurate. All of them I had come across during my time in Lordran. Each one of them had different fighting styles and personalities; and surprisingly something to teach me as well.

Elizabeth was a shy but incredibly powerful mage. Easily able to match even Logan in both strength and intellect, she was held back by she reclusive nature. The reach of hollowing had yet to meet her, and her downfall would've been damning; it was rare to find someone with such high fidelity to themselves. So I taught her so that when Death had finally found her, she would not give up and continue on through the hardship. I was perhaps the easiest on her.

It should be no surprise that the things that I learned from her were things that I just hadn't known before. I learned facts and legends that I would've never had from her, and gained a basic understanding of how soul magic worked.

I once managed to truly, all the way down to the soul, anger her. I made sure that I never tried that again.

Xavier was a completely different creature. He was a demon, having incredible strength and dexterity, easily able to kill a Capra Demon with his bare hands. But his attitude was that nothing would be able to stop him, and took every instance to prove it. I promptly destroyed that thought when I punted him through a wall. I did not see the purpose in teaching him, but he sought me out and it ended up in that way. He hardened as he threw himself at me, eventually enough to finally defeat me. I was clearly the toughest on him.

The strange thing was that he was always stronger and faster than me, but he always ended up on his back with a blade against his neck. He learned that everything added onto strength, and that my determinization trumped his physical attribute at every turn. He taught me that there was always room for improvement, always potential that one could call upon, unseen or not.

Still… His personality made it so that even the most blatant show of affection flew right over his head. It was so bad that at times I couldn't even look at him without looking completely ashamed.

Robert was… Weird. At times he was a complete moron, then suddenly he had knowledge that could shame both Elizabeth and Logan combined. He was always searching for something: A fight, books on legends, answers, directions, himself, and… _pleasure. _Unlike the others, I did not run into him and decided to teach him. I found myself drifting toward wherever he was. Robert's attitude was something that was not from the influence of the curse. In fact, the curse seemed like a feather on his shoulders; it would not stop him from doing anything. He was like an undying twister: Constantly changing and causing damages.

The very same attitude attracted the attention of all in his vicinity, good or bad. It was not uncommon for me to end up in fights when I approached him. His actions had even ended the life of one of my allies. It was something that I almost couldn't forgive him for. But once I put him under my wing, I found him to be one of the most heartfelt, down-to-earth and intelligent people I knew. It did not take long for him to become my equal.

In the end it was enough that I trusted Robert to take care of my mistress in my stead. I was certain he wouldn't betray her or anyone else caring for her under any circumstances. Though I still had a problem with his… _drive._

I let out a wary sigh, the thoughts of my students bringing back a slew of memories.

"Uh, Mark…?" A voice dragged me away from my thoughts and brought me back to reality. The voice was Sheele's. "Did you have a teacher?" The look in her eyes were off-putting in the way that I couldn't read them.

I shook my head. "No, I'm entirely self taught." I already knew how the answer would affect Sheele when her face became a little bit sad. I just smiled at her and put a hand on her head.

"Hey, don't worry about that," I pressed down and messed up her hair. "I'm fine."

I stepped back and opened up my arms, a grin plastered on my face. "See?" When she said nothing, I just sighed and reached into my bottomless box and pulled out a couple prism stones and began to juggle them.

I managed to do it for only a couple seconds until I dropped them. The stones shattered on the ground, leaving traces of glimmering color on the ground.

"Shit."

Everyone broke into another laughing fit, this time at my expense. Sheele was among them. I smiled again and laughed along with them. I knew what Sheele was worried about, but I had long since gotten over it.

"Back to business," Najenda spoke up when the laughter died down, and everyone straightened up. "The reason that we're doing this mission tonight it because Iokal is going to host a 'public showing' around 11. Our scouts discovered that before he host his 'show', he goes out to watch fireworks. With that, it gives us the perfect time to kill: the moment he sets foot outside his compound.

"However, since it's a 'public showing', his security is likely to be on higher guard, so it is entirely possible that more than the five may come after you. Watch out for them."

"And if there are?" Leone asked.

"Avoid fighting them. If you come into contact with one and they are hostile, eliminate them. Otherwise sack them."

Everyone nodded. That was part of Night Raid's creed. "Leave no witnesses." It didn't entirely mean to kill them, but it you didn't, you would have to drag them along. Like what happened to Tatsumi.

The rule of thumb was to kill them though. There was a reason some of us were on Wanted posters after all.

"This is a high priority mission since Iokal is one of the Prime Minister's relatives. Due to it's nature and the area it is located in, I am sending out all of you."

"Oh, it's been awhile since a mission like this," Bulat commented.

Najenda quickly assigned us to roles. "Mine. You are to assassinate Iokal. Tatsumi, you will be her bodyguard, as you are her subordinate for now."

She let grin come to her face when Tatsumi let out a long suffering sigh.

"Akame, Bulat, Leone, Lubbock Sheele. You are assigned to take out the guards."

"Understood," they all replied.

Najenda finally turned to me. "Mark, you're assigned to support and signal." She scratched her head. "This is actually the first time we've had enough people to use this. Your job is to signal the team and make sure that everyone makes it back."

I nodded. It was not hard to see that Night Raid was a very balanced group before I joined. Since I was essentially an extra, I could do things that they couldn't before with their limited numbers.

"This is a vital mission, be prepared." Najenda slapped her hand against the table. "And with that, the meeting is over."

Rising up to her full height, Najenda planted a foot on the table and pointed to the sky. She took a dramatic second to fill her lungs and pulled out her charisma from leading troops into brave combat. Her next words were ones that anyone could attest to.

"**Now. To the DINNER TABLE!"**

The roar that erupted from our ranks would beat an army by the emotion alone. Like the wave of a tsunami, it was an unstoppable force of nature as the combined marching beat of our footsteps lead into the eating wing. The rumble of our stomachs would scare all but the hardiest of men, and the look in our eyes could kill Danger Beasts with a single gaze.

Truly we were an assassination group to be feared.

* * *

The moment the explosive reached it's predetermined height, it went off. Scattering a multitude of colored sparkles into the night sky, it was an example of a perfect firework. As they fell, the sparkles broke off into other bits, leaving behind satisfying crackles.

But even before it could go off, a silent beam of pure energy ripped across the air, directly aimed at the mansion. Following it with my enhanced eyes, I saw it slip cleanly past all of the civilian servant girls.

The lance of light hit Iokal square in the forehead. Whipping his head back, he was swept from his feet. His soul slipped away before he even hit the ground. All in all, an impressive shot from a very long distance.

However, I felt slightly disappointed. While it was incredibly good, I was let down by the fact that Mine had said she was going to shoot him right between his eyes, something she very clearly failed to do.

Not good enough, Chuckles would say.

As soon as I confirmed his death, I slipped my bow back into my Bottomless box. I stepped back against a tree, and waited.

I heard the sounds of combat come from in from the front. I crossed my arms and almost began to relax.

_***Crack***_

"Hmm?" I let out, my head shifted to the left. A fist ruptured the wood behind where my head was just a moment ago. Without another wasted moment, I reached out and pushed the source.

"Ugh." My attacker grunted as he flew back, landing on his feet a distance away.

"I knew that there was going to be someone who would kill Iokal. That's why I took that job after all." The man laughed. He had spiky grey hair and a wild grin on his face. He wore a simple blue bodysuit and two katanas hanging from his hips. Along with his bandaged limbs and blue scarf, he made the perfect model for ninja wear. "So you're part of Night Raid…"

I said nothing, responding by pushing up from the tree that I was leaning on. There was something that I saw in his eyes: complete bloodlust.

This man was a demon disguised in human flesh. A person who spilled blood for the sake of seeing it all over themselves. Someone who kills solely for the feeling of ending another's life.

"You seem weaker than the others," he said, evaluating me. "Is that why you were hiding behind the rest of the others?"

Silence was my answer. I just lifted up my arms in a defensive stance for the things I knew were coming.

He covered the distance quickly, giving me only a moment to react. I ducked, feeling the air buff me from a blade that moved too fast to be seen. I twisted to the side when another invisible slash ripped through the air, pushing me to the ground. I threw myself to the side as a deadly cross cut narrowly missed my back.

I quickly get to my feet only to have to dodge another slash and I backstepped. My assailant followed with a lunge to close the distance, and I stepsided. Whipping out my hand, I grabbed his arm and threw him away.

Digging his feet into the ground, he skidded to a stop.

"So you're stalling," he said. When I didn't respond, he continued. "Fine. I'll make this easy and cut you up into so many pieces no one will be able to recognize your face under that ugly mask!"

He sheathed his blades and closed his eyes. Immediately I went on guard and lifted up my arms.

His eyes snapped open and that was the only warning that I got. His foot left the ground and suddenly his speed increases three-fold. The distance was nothing to him as he crossed it faster than a blink of an eye and unleashed a fury of slashes at my person.

It was to the extent that I could no longer dodge without getting cut, bits and pieces of my clothing being hacked off in the tornado of blades. I moved back, trying to create some distance, but failed. He went after me like a shark to blood.

Little sirens in my head lit up as he sheathed his blades once again, just a couple feet away from me. As soon as the katanas clicked inside their sheaths, they flashed out with ungodly speed.

Under my mask, I grinned. Finally, a hit with sufficient force.

Faster than twice that speed, my hands pulled up and met the metal. Grabbing the sides of the one-sided blades, I pushed out and used their momentum against him. Then I pulled back, and the blades snapped like twigs.

"Still got it."

Instantly, I moved my hand in practiced ease into his stomach, feeling all of the organs around the area pop from the force. I let him fall to his knees. He stared up at me, surprise covering his face. I reeled back and punched in right in the face, sending straight down.

I felt no remorse in the action of killing the man; I'd seen too many like him to even care. People like that had to be killed. No amount of therapy or counseling could make them change.

I gave him one last look, when I froze.

A sharp twinge ran up through my arm. I didn't have to look at it to know what it was; I could hear it calling to me regardless. But the thought of the thing that lived in my right arm didn't worry me as much as the thoughts running through my head.

Staring up into the sky, the dying man let out his final breaths. His hands clawed uselessly against the cold dirt before suddenly stopping; not because he stop himself, but because he couldn't move them anymore. His mouth fell open as he let out one last bubbled cry, and fell still.

It was not long after that his soul left his body. I turned away and began to walk to our planned meeting spot, but only one thing was on my mind.

'_There was something in his eyes. Something too human.'_

* * *

As it turned out, there was only two more fighters that had been hired, and both of them died. We all met up where we planned without any problems.

It seemed like one of the guards had managed to get past both the main group and myself, as Mine and Tatsumi reported a minor complication. However, seeing as when we found them there was half a human corpse and both of the younger assassins were arguing like an old couple, it was safe to say that they'd taken care of it.

After they calmed down, we all headed back. Lubbock scouted forward to make sure that we didn't end up running into anyone as we moved forwards, while I had the duty of covering up our tracks. It was clear as day that Night Raid had killed Iokal, but it wouldn't help us at all if they found out where our base was.

It TOTALLY wasn't enough that half our group was on wanted posters already.

So after a quick final security check, we all said our goodnights and left to our respective rooms. When I got into mine however, the grasp of sleep did not come to me easily.

Feeling like the sleep would be a hinder than anything else (as I didn't need it, being undead), I left my room and went outside. Taking a quick walk, I found what I was looking for: a fire pit. Tossing in a couple logs, I lit it with a quick burst of my pyroflame.

Watching the fire slowly shimmer into life, I reached out with a hand. As though in response, the flames reached out towards me, and coiled around my outstretched limb. My pyroflame sung as the flames licked around my fist and up my arm.

Feeling more refreshed than I would have after some sleep, I leaned back and rested my head on the ground. I watched the smoke lazily float up a couple meters, before the rough wind came and dispersed them.

I reached into the layers of my clothing, and felt the closest thing to my heart reach my palm. I clasped it gently and revealed it.

It was a simple pendant by all means. Melded from classic silver, it once bore a crest, but time had long since worn it away. The links connected to it were just brass. Nothing special.

But with it, a flood of memories entered my mind, just like it had countless times before. Timeless hours devoted were those memories, each touched by a graceful hand.

I brought it up to my lips and brushed it gently against them.

"I have a lot on my mind…" I whispered quietly. There was a moment of silence before I let out a short chuckle. "You always know what I'm thinking…"

I relinquished control of my body and all of my limbs went limp, the hand holding the pendant still closed as it rested against my chest.

"Would you mind listening to me?" The words were so quiet that not even the gods could hear me.

"Rhea?"

* * *

_There was a time where my life had held no meaning. Every action that I took had no life, everything was worthless to me. Whatever past that I had did not matter, because those actions had left me in a hell that I could not escape; so what was the point._

_My interactions with people could be summed up as following their instructions to a tee, regardless of their reputation or status. After all, what did that mean to someone who cared about nothing? I knew that this attitude would get me manipulated, but that didn't matter. So long as I was doing something._

_I ended up in a ditch, quite literally. Tricked by someone called 'Patches the Hyena', he kicked me down into a hole. I woke up soon after, and I continued on as normal. It wasn't the first time._

_It was dark, unimaginably so. Even with the lantern that I had brought along with me, I could only see a couple feet in front of myself; it was like the dark was eating away at the light. But I only had to walk a couple of feet to find another tricked soul._

_Coiled up in a ball on the ground, she looked just like a cowering child. The shivering of her body told me just as much. When I approached, she lifted up her face. It became clear that she had spent a long time weeping, dried tears hung against her pale face._

_But when I got close enough to speak, that frail look had all but disappeared, replaced by disappointing self-deprecation. As if it was only a little distressing. But she could not hide her eyes. Those were filled with fear._

_I knew who she was. During my exploration of a distant area, I ran into her. At the time, she was not alone; in fact she was surrounded by comrades-in-arms. Her name was Rhea, of the family of Thorolund. At the time, she was headstrong, and just waved me off as an annoyance. The others were more open, even if it was just by a little bit._

_Petrus, a "kind" cleric that had given me several miracles to use in the past. He was a stout supporter of the church, perhaps a little too much for my liking. Then there was Vince, a strong youth who was a childhood friend of Rhea. He was initially hostile, but warmed up to me when it became clear that I meant them no harm. Finally, there was Nico. I didn't know what to think of him; he was constantly mumbling to the point that no one but Rhea or Vince could understand him._

_Imagine my surprise finding her alone in a ditch, weeping for her losses._

_After a moment of hesitation, she spoke. "You're no hollow, are you?"_

_I shook my head._

"_Thank goodness." She paused. "Please be careful. There are two fierce hollows not far from here." She pointed off into the darkness, a seemingly random direction. Her arm dropped back to her person. "They were once brave knights… My former escorts. Who would let such strong spirits be Hollowed so?"_

_I began to walk in the direction she pointed at; she didn't even notice the receding light. "Heavens… Is there nothing… Nothing at all to be done?"_

_Ran into the two hollows. The once sentient Nico and Vince turned to animals under the curse. The strength they held in life carried through into their depraved bodies, the swinging of their weapons a death sentence. I ended their lifeless existence quickly. It was almost depressing how relatively weak they were compared to my first thoughts of them. In life, they were perhaps one of the few that could draw my attention by pure intent alone._

_Wonder what happened to them in this dark pit._

_Whatever did never showed it's face to me, so I went back to the place where Rhea laid. I found her staring mindlessly in the direction where I had left, not even noticing that I approached until I was directly in front of her._

"_You banished those two Hollows, did you?" Her voice was quiet. "It pains me to think of the trouble my failings have caused. I am certain that both Vince and Nico are grateful to you." I could tell she was essentially breaking at this point, but held on. "Thank you so very much. Here, these belonged to them. You deserve them more than I."_

_She handed me a scroll, a label gently wrapped around it. I pocketed it._

"_Perhaps… I will meet them on the other side…" Rhea quietly whispered to herself, collapsing to the ground and curled up._

_Rhea's breath slowed down and tears silently crept from her closed eyes. I knew that if she was going to lay here any longer, the next time I would see her, Rhea would be nothing more than a walking corpse. It was something that I didn't wish to see happen, not to anyone but those that truly deserved it._

_I knelt down beside her and gently slipped my hands underneath her body. With those very hands I lifted up, and cradled her close to my chest. She was incredibly light, not even comparable to half of the weapons I had in my collection._

_I eventually made it out of the pit. Trusty Patches made a quick few deals with me because of the amount of bloodlust I let out (however fake; I never held a grudge against it because that was entirely my fault). I hid Rhea nearby as it became clear Patches did not like the presence of clerics and Rhea appeared to be one of high standing._

_I made my way to the bonfire, Rhea resting on my shoulder, and used it to warp outside; back to Firelink Shrine. It was then that she returned to consciousness._

"_Wh-" She cut off when she finally got her bearings of the situation. Unsurprisingly, she checked herself. She was somewhere else entirely after all, and things may have happened. When it became clear that nothing had happened, she brought her eyes to the ground._

_She did not want my help. She had wanted to die in that place. I could see it in Rhea's eyes._

_The way that things were going at, she was going to Hollow regardless of the fact that I had saved her from that pit._

_So I went to my knees and pulled her hands into one of my own. Her eyes looked up in alarm as my hand reached around to my Bottomless Box. However, I did not pull out any weapon; instead I pulled out something I had found when I checked over the bodies of Nico and Vince._

_A letter. Addressed directly to Rhea, and Rhea alone. Normally, I would have opened up the letter and read it, but something stopped me. It was a miracle that I had never seen before, a strange variation of the Homeward miracle I had familiarized myself with. It prevented my eyes from seeing the contents within._

_I enclosed the envelope into Rhea's pale hands and retracted myself away from her. A strange look crossed her face as she saw what now laid in her hands, and examined it. After a moments hesitation, she opened it up._

_If the tears from before were rain, then the next were a waterfall._


End file.
